How to balance inbound and outbound product marketing

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1. Pre-product market fit: Inbound takes priority “If you're pre-revenue or still searching for product-market fit, you should be heavily focused on inbound product marketing.” Post-product market fit: Shift to outbound

   In Channel mix allocation

2. Pre-product market fit: Inbound takes priority “You need to ensure you're building the right thing for the right people.” Post-product market fit: Shift to outbound

   In Channel mix allocation

3. What product marketing really means: Beyond the shelf analogy “When I talk about inbound and outbound product marketing, I'm not referring to your go-to-market motion. I'm not talking about how your sales team is structured. This is something entirely different.” I first encountered this framework over a year ago during a casual conversation with one of my PMM Camp community members who works at TikTok. When I asked how product marketing was structured there, he said they had two teams: inbound and outbound.

   In Channel mix allocation

4. Why inbound matters more than you think “Without strong inbound product marketing, you end up in that all-too-familiar situation where product builds something in isolation, then tosses it over the wall for marketing to figure out how to sell.” When I was at Unbounce, I actually built my teams around this concept without even realizing it. I'd always have what I called a "segmentation, pricing, and packaging research PMM". Essentially an inbound product marketer who served as an internal management consultant for the rest of the team.

   In Channel mix allocation

5. How to know which side to prioritize “The answer depends entirely on where you are in your product development lifecycle.” Pre-product market fit: Inbound takes priority

   In Channel mix allocation

6. Once you've found product-market fit, the pendulum swings. Now it's about putting fuel on the fire. Most of your effort shifts to outbound—figuring out how to reach more customers, refine your messaging, and scale your go-to-market engine. “But here's the thing: it's never entirely one or the other. Even mature companies need inbound work when they're:” Entering new markets

   In Stage-based channel mix

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