How do the marketing teams differ between AWS and retail? Which would you advise joining? #marketing #amazon
Retail is better than AWS
My experience is based on contracting for the retail side and supporting AWS while at an agency. My anecdotal experience was that retail has a lower bar in general, but also lower pressure and better work/life balance. AWS is certainly more prestigious (doubley so if you want to build a career specifically in marketing tech/cloud computing) and you'll work with some crazy smart people, but I also know the program managers I worked with kept ungodly working hours.
Worked with a PM from DDb. He certainly worked crazy hours. He used to carpool with other pms and tell use stories about them like going to the cinema at 10pm ish to get away from family and work.
Someone once joked to me that their sleeping hours was 1 to 5 am. Only they weren't really joking.
Do you prefer consumer or B2B marketing? They are completely different worlds with pros/cons to each. Depends on your career goals.
This is spot on. Essentially these are also two industries.
Retail. But depends on the team. Big new initiative...say by to WLB. But outdoor sports or furniture are a straight 40 with no bs.
Don’t know what AWS marketing does frankly..it’s like passing info from left hand to right with no thought process.
The marketing orgs with the best cultures and enough budget to do cool work imo are Alexa, XCM and AWS. Others vary team by team (some are great but have small budgets, others are not so great but have more money).
I've done marketing for .com and AWS. The retail side can be demanding because you there's always a holiday sale (almost every month). On retail you are more focused on how to optimize CTRs for on-site merch, which can be cool because a .1% increase in a CTR can mean thousands (if not millions) of more people clicking on your ad. Retail marketing tools and metrics, while clunky and not user friendly, are far more sophisticated than AWS's because the site actually makes money. If you are a PMM at AWS then you are more focused on the messaging and positioning of products vs optimizing campaigns for CTR. That said, there are plenty of other non-PMM marketing roles focused on campaign execution and optimizing CTRs. Times get crazy around re:Invent, but that's only once a year. Also, if you want to be a PMM at AWS you'll need to familiarize yourself with AWS services. Overall, WLB is about the same, but maybe a little more reasonable on the AWS side IMO. Retail is more casual and hierarchical, while AWS is relatively flat, which means you get good viz.
This sounds about right based on my experience looping for a retail side PMM role. I was surprised how Digital Marketing oriented the role was. It wasn't really a product marketing role at all, which is probably why I was passed on heh.
If retail tools are more sophisticated than AWS then WOOOOOF lol
AWS Marketing is the worst marketing org I experienced in my 3 years there. Politics on all levels, clueless leadership that changes course every 6-month with reorg, and a disfunctional marketing tech stack. Retail marketing orgs are by far not perfect but appear to be getting sh*t done at least.
AWS marketing isnt well respected and seem to have a pretty low bar for hires. Other teams like PM and BD have to take on a lot of PMM responsibilities.
It’s so true except our BD sucks as well.
AWS far less crazy. Don’t have to deal with the peak periods.
Not entirely true. Don’t forget Re:Invent, ReMars, and other big events that are splashy and showcase a lot of product launches for AWS. They have their own ‘peaks’ throughout the year.