ProductColab

Building an AI-augmented innovation ecosystem that helps founders, entrepreneurs, and small business owners navigate zero-to-one growth challenges through integrated consulting, educational content, and community knowledge sharing.

Focus areas: Authentic marketing strategy, AI-augmented content systems, brand development, technical marketing implementation, startup growth consulting

Co-Founder | Operating Partner | AI Acceleration, Systems & Marketing Infrastructure

ReadySetABA

Collaborates on strategic company direction, marketing initiatives, and go to market strategy for newly released services. Designed and developed our website from the ground up, incorporating no-code tools to manage processes and workflows. Contributes to content creation & video production.

Co-Founder | COO | Operations, Growth, Marketing

Wallaroo.AI

Fractional Head of Marketing

Product Marketing Alliance

Member of the PMA community, with 100s of hours' worth of product marketing presentations, tons of templates, exclusive content, mentors, and more, PMA's membership is a key for leveling up.

Pro+ Member

LeadIQ

Fractional Head of Product Marketing

Citeworthy Inc.

CastorDoc

- Founding Product Marketing: Defined and built the foundation of strategic product marketing at CastorDoc.

- Established foundational GTM framework**: Instituted a process with the Product team to ensure PMM is included in product discovery and spec processes, facilitating better product-market fit and go-to-market strategy.

- Founding Positioning & Messaging**: Created a foundational narrative around product offerings, highlighting the unique value proposition and differentiators to communicate with our target audience.

- Segmentation: Conducted win/loss analysis across all customers and deals to build comprehensive profiles of leading segments.

- Built Essential PMM Dashboards: Established the first product marketing metrics dashboard, providing visibility into key performance indicators like MQLs, SQLs, win rates, churn rates, and ROI.

- Sales Enablement and Documentation: Revamped the sales enablement assets and improved the process around product release notes, internal assets, and documentation to improve user experience, increase product adoption and win rates.

-Rebrand: Applied foundational positioning to website messaging and all rebrand assets, including development of brand identity.  

- Paired strategic thinking and creativity with a data-driven approach to deliver measurable outcomes for the business and foster a deeper understanding of our customers.

Founding Product Marketing Lead

Mode

Plan and manage GTM product launches across all tiers. Works directly with product teams to influence roadmap priorities and manage GTM releases.

Proposes and scopes core product marketing efforts, including market segment research and validation, messaging go-to-market strategy, and storytelling. Competitive research informing positioning and product strategy.

Cultivated key strategic partnerships with leaders across product and go-to-market teams to demonstrate the value of product marketing. 

Researched to build out customer personas, segmentation, and develop content tailored to customers throughout their lifecycle, to increase feature usage and grow customer organizations.

Product Marketing Manager

Knack.com

Highly collaborative, cross-functional role working with a no-code/low-code SaaS product as 3rd hire with acquisition. Coordinated with Leadership, Product, Success, Sales, Growth, and Data teams on a daily basis to drive customer education and product adoption. 

Focuses on using team and customer feedback alongside data driven insights to educate customers throughout the customer lifecycle on how Knack’s value can solve their pain points. This includes building and iterating on customer onboarding, reviewing new features and product updates for educational opportunities and copywriting needs, and creating content to support teams within Knack. 
Coordinated release milestones and messaging for all feature releases and product updates. Planned and created all customer messaging for product updates, through email, in-app messaging, social media promotional messaging, and video content. 

Leads educational initiatives such as managing the knowledge base, developer documentation and video library. Worked on strategic educational direction, defining organizational approaches and style guides defining audience profiles. Coordinated migrations and updates for the knowledge base and developer documentation to align with product overhauls. Participated in KnackCon user conferences in London and Chicago, joining teammates in running the conference and leading sessions for 50-100 person audiences.

Helps manage initiatives to build data driven insights in the company processes. Contributed to defining our foundational approach to data and baseline customer lifecycle reporting. Worked with initiates from building strategic approaches for data to building SQL reports. 

Coordinates and leads initiatives on the Growth team to drive strategy and create content collaborating directly with the Head of Marketing & Leadership. Creates content such as blogs, marketing copy, social media and videos. Reviews, edits and publishes content and manages content provided by content writers.

Product Marketing Lead 

Participated in shaping the company and building the Customer Success team as the 3rd company hire. Supported a wide audience of customers with varying business sizes and skill sets on a robust technical SaaS product through email, chat, and scheduled phone calls. Regularly adapted messaging to target the customer’s business size (ranging from solo entrepreneurs to enterprise customers) and the customer’s skill set (ranging from little-to-no technical knowledge to customers with extensive technical knowledge as developers). Focused on finding the teaching opportunity in each customer interaction and propagating customer insights throughout the company to relevant teams. Contributed to building out the Customer Success team by screening applications, running and joining interviews, onboarding and mentoring new hires. Managed weekly Customer Success meetings and led feedback sessions with teammates. 

Collaborated with other teams and projects outside of direct Customer Success, such as documentation, growth, and product. Assisted in building and maintaining the company’s original knowledge base and developer documentation. Managed knowledge base migrations for product updates and new features. Managed product translations for multiple languages and website updates with code commits to Client and Server. Managed emergency support requests triaging issues with engineers and communicating progress and next steps with the customer. Triaged product downtime on social media. Joined the Culture Committee by teammate nomination to help craft the first official set of Knack values.

3rd Hire: Customer Success | Marketing, Content & Documentation

Uber / ZeroChaos

Community Support Representative

Fractional Head of Product Marketing | Product Marketing Strategy

I've spent 10+ years working in technical B2B SaaS companies—from employee #3 stage through Series C. I've been lucky enough to work at companies that got acquired (Knack, Mode Analytics), which taught me a lot about what actually matters when you're building for the long haul.

What I do:
I build product marketing from scratch at technical companies where "product" actually means something in product marketing. My sweet spot is complex products—AI/ML infrastructure, data analytics, developer tools, workflow automation—where you need someone who can talk to engineers and then translate that into messaging that makes sense to buyers.

I've led marketing at places like Wallaroo AI (MLOps infrastructure) and LeadIQ (sales tech). I've also done foundational PMM work at early-stage startups still figuring out their positioning and GTM strategy. Turns out I'm drawn to the messy early stages—building frameworks, setting up processes, helping teams figure out what resonates.

What I've learned:
I care a lot about cross-functional collaboration between product, engineering, and go-to-market. Too many Product Marketers forget about the "Product" in their title. I actually like working with technical teams to shape what we're building, not just marketing what gets shipped.

I'm comfortable building with constraints. I've rebuilt marketing with little-to-no budget, launched products without big teams, and figured out how to move fast with what we have. Turns out constraints make you creative.

I've gotten pretty good at translating technical complexity. Whether it's ML model deployment, data governance, or gnarly integrations, I can take technical capabilities and turn them into narratives that resonate.

I have strategic and tactical range. I've led teams and worked solo. I've built integrated campaigns and shaped company-wide positioning. I can do the high-level strategy work and also just get stuff done.

Right now:
I'm running ProductColab, helping early-stage technical companies build their marketing foundations—positioning, GTM strategy, messaging, and the cross-functional bits that connect marketing with product.

Always happy to connect about opportunities at technical B2B companies building interesting products where product-market fit actually matters.

Dani Kellogg

Zach Roberts 💀

I get complex B2B software SEEN and SOLD in workflows your buyers KNOW | Co-Host @We’re Not Marketers

I’m a former tech seller.

And what I say next might shock you, even be “salesy”

Sometimes software sells itself.
While cool software is hard to close. 

I know firsthand, because in 2017. 

I became a first-time AE at an edtech company. My then-colleague gleamed,

“Teachers love our product!”

Great. Then why am I
- Making 60 dials daily
- Chasing no-show calls
- Fighting for limited budget

Love doesn’t buy cool software. Not always. Real talk. 

If you’re a startup, it’s not a viable way to sell software. And that’s just it.

I had what most tech founders desire in sellers: 
- Affable personality
- Goal-oriented mindset
- Sales training at LinkedIn

Yet all that didn’t win every deal. 

So I did what any Type-A professional would do: I got curious on what didn’t work.

And here’s what I found:

- Interest doesn’t always convert. 
- Lesser features might stand out.
- Not all questions can be objection handled.

A few months later. I built pipeline faster than the most tenured rep. 

My then-manager surprised, beginner’s luck? 

It happened again, at another startup. Small deals then, massive repeat orders later, late-blooming as #1 AE. “Can I teach this?”

Fast forward 2020. 

As a sales enablement PMM at Dropbox, two $1.2MM sales plays later:

One enthused seller said…“This is no different from our pitch, but now? We can *actually* answer their questions, with proof!” 

Here’s why.

A clear workflow does what most AI platforms can’t. It speaks to what buyers know and trust. That new language became Scope & Sequence:

A product marketing consultancy for software startups who turn stalled deals into shorter deal cycles. 

Here’s how my “Stop Chasing Sales” system works: 

- Phase 1: Audit your website on actual buyer questions. See what works and find gaps which might be making selling harder. Get a full report in one week. 

- Phase 2: Dial in on your POV. Get how it relates to your ideal buyer workflow. Deliver a sales-ready deck within next two weeks. 

- Phase 3: Get a full scope on your buyer workflow. See a clear sequence of what your sales process needs to make what you sell, easier. 

This workflow system takes one month, start to finish.

It’s what I used in sales, refined as an in-house PMM, and what I’ve delivered to several companies in last few years.

Because software isn’t hard to sell: 

What you solve + clear workflow gaps = easy yes.

Ready to make your sales process easier? DM me! 

Founder

I help B2B product marketing leaders in SaaS businesses deliver on work critical to your GTM engine, keeping internal stakeholders happy, and executive leadership to sing your praise. 

Yesterday I gave up American Dreams for 3 more years of Mexico City residency. 

White-picket fences, Bud Light and, a family dog who might bark in English. 

Not sure on latter. 😉 Bad move?  

Until proven, what I’ve discovered instead:

- Don’t take hot showers for granted. 
- When not understood, ‘talking louder’ almost never helps. 
- But no better feeling than a local asking *you* for directions. Duolingo streaks? Nah. 
- Earthquakes happen. Wear clothes when evacuating. 
- 401Ks are built on job security. 

More on last point. It’s LinkedIn, can’t speak on second-to-last line item. 🧖🏾‍♂️

Walking out of immigration yesterday, 2025 (I reflected) was kinda shaky ground. 

- Rocked with late-night anxiety 
- Sought stability in a new offer 
- Still uncertain of what’s next

So guys. 2026 gonna go 1 of 2 ways:
- Scope & Sequence pops off, better
- Teach English for street tacos

Because job security is kinda on a 3-year hiatus. 
Until then, I’m building something new. 

Stay tuned…

Zach Roberts 

Low win rates? Something’s coming. | Co-Host @We’re Not Marketers

Last week, I got a call at 5:56am. A Liberian area code. Which meant one thing. 

“Hey, how are you?”  “Oh Zach, I’m resting, sleeping in until noon, everyday.” 
Overdue relief in her voice. 

“You deserve it, mom. Wait, do I hear kids playing?”

3 weeks in at the new retirement mansion we built for her. Still can’t believe it.

“Yes. I have a creek in my backyard. 
The mothers in village nearby
bring their kids to bathe and, 
wash their laundry.”

Strong emotions locked up, as a bilingual Black dude. Best to keep them in. Early life and corporate work prior said so.

Yet, there I was, tears blurring vision. 

Right there. My vision for Scope & Sequence changed too. 

- The 6:30am gym workouts 
- The chicken scratch thoughts I journal
- The mini-anxiety spirals every other Friday
- The small aha moments after hours of research
- The pipeline drier than my winter skin (3 hours unlotioned lol) 

What if I’m not building a six-figure business? It’s Sunday Jan 11th, I haven’t billed a single dollar, ayyy! 

But what if you’re building something else, better?

Most days. 

I still do rise ‘n grind at 5:30am, with a different outlook now. 
A second chance to hear kids playing at her creek.

Earlier today, my girlfriend wanted to show me her ‘cajones’. Naturally, I was confused. Surprised? Not my first bilingual rodeo. 

She then walks over, pulls her drawers, and leaves me in disbelief. “¡No me digas!”

15 years, I’m counting and, one bad grade in AP Spanish still bucks me over. 

The best part? 

It was our long-distance FaceTime call.

‘Cajones’ were actually drawers to the new dresser, she wanted to show me. 

“What do you think?” Let me tell you. 

- I studied college-level Spanish
- Lived in Mexico for 379 days
- Googled ‘cajones’ (with Safe Search “On”)

You can talk your audience’s language, know day-to-day and, still not get it. 

Real talk. If you’re a solo overworked marketer, it could happen in your sales process too. 

I promise you, it’s not my first rodeo. What I’m building (in public) might help. 

Hit the ‘bell’ for future updates. 

📸: Sunday park stroll in Mexico City.

How to do buyer research?
One way which drove sales, as a first-time AE: 

↳ What’s changing in their world  
↳ Why this matters now  
↳ How their industry behaves  
↳ Why you’re different
 
Here’s how.

Starting in 2017. 
I built pipeline faster than the most tenured rep.

My manager thought it was beginner’s luck.
Then it happened again at another startup.

Small deals returning as massive repeat orders. 
Eventually closing in as #1 AE. 

Sounds like humblebrag proof, sorry.

Fast forward 2020. 
Sales enablement PMM at Dropbox: 
"Can I teach this?"

Two $1.2MM sales plays later, one seller told me:

“This is no different from our pitch, but now? 
We can actually answer their questions, with proof!”

Founders? Sales collateral does make selling easier. 
As long as they answer actual buyer questions. 

Deep Research AI doesn’t always. 
This framework does help. 

↳ What’s changing?  
↳ Why now?  
↳ How does our industry behave?  
↳ Why’s our company different?  
↳ Our product?
↳ And this sales rep?
↳ Why AI? 

Quick take on last one. Buyers are curious about AI, just not in the way we think. 

Seems obvious? Maybe.
But obvious isn’t the same as operational. What fixes our actual workflows.

The best product CAN sell itself, when answering questions buyers have.

Because back to AI. It can create collateral. 
But it isn't always obvious in what buyers want.

Your competitors know and use AI? Let them.
What most don’t know? Your buyer’s workflow.

That you do know.

And just like that. I’m fluent in a skill I once absolutely SUCKED at. 

Yesterday, there I was. 

Healthy eating avocado rice, while half-watching ‘90 Day Fiancé’ and, the weirdest thing happened next. 

A dinner-table convo in Colombian Spanish. 

I then paused (myself and TV), looked closer, and nope! 

- No English subtitles on screen
- No bilingual-enhanced spider bites 

Yup. I understood a different language, without fully listening. 

- I do live in Mexico City
- Studied Spanish since 7th grade

Who cares? I do, because listening to Spanish always were my Black Eyed Peas. I really never understood either (“My humps” is terrible music). 

Anyways, what changed? 

- My 368 days living here?
- My two times using Duolingo?

Nope, it was ‘looking bad’. That’s it, let me share more.

I’ve been in a bilingual relationship for six months. Worst critique I get is I ‘don’t ever listen’. Rapid-fire Spanish isn’t easy! 

But for fear of being dumped, I had to change. That was it, I realized. 

People change habits when:
- there’s intense interest to do so
- and looking really bad is a steep price 

Selling ‘transformation’ isn’t promoting an app. That almost never works. 

===

And with that, I’m proud to announce… I’m a man, who can listen. Feel free to congratulate me in the comments, or don’t. 😂

No alternative text description for this image

Last month, I got a call from a solo marketer, her output put AI to shame. Startup lead volume agreed. Yet her tone suggested otherwise.

“Zach – check this out. 
It’s everything I’ve done since Q1 (2025).” 

“Woah. So what’s the problem then?”

She owned marketing at a virtual reality startup. Users could tour apartments on their phones, while watching the Packers lose (lol). 

It was pretty cool. 

Their awards from Belguim agreed too. 
That's why 'market expansion' was on their mind.

“We hired an SDR agency. 
They called over 25K accounts in 30 days.”

“My god, Stefi. That’s incredible, 
how many did they convert?”

She was in disbelief too. “3 meetings.”
But wait, it gets better. 

“So umm… how does your exec team feel about this?”

“My cofounders are ECSTATIC!” When she tried to ask why, this was their reply:

(Her words, paraphrased)

“Don’t worry about biz goals, let us do that,
just focus on finding more leads.”

It was crystal-clear. 20 minutes later. 
We decided not to work together. 

I'll say more.

Yes, they had UNBELIEVABLE lead volume. 
And despite, 24,997 of them not converting.
Her leadership saw no problem.

Because if your startup might fixate more on lead volume, than actual lead quality. If it’s in such hyper-growth, it can’t take a beat and see ‘what’s not working?’

And not use that intel to:
- improve expected conversions
- and speed up sale cycles

Then it might be better to hire an SDR agency.

And if you do, here’s the most simple and easy insurance policy against bad-fit leads.

I outline it in the infographic below, to sum it up: 
→ Gather all your qual notes 
→ Export them to a spreadsheet
→ And run an AI agent to identify trends 
→ Use that insight to refine your lead qualification 

That’s one way toward faster sales cycles, better lead quality. Using what you know doesn’t work – to find more of what does. 

Try it out. And if you want to underwrite your SDR agency a bit more? 

I’ve been there, as an SDR then and PMM consultant today. And if you're really serious, shoot me a DM.

Sometimes software sells itself.
Sometimes cool software is hard to close. Here's why.

Scott Galloway once said:
“I invest only in boring businesses.” 

Yet it did make sense. Boring businesses aren’t

→ AI-powered
→ Bleeding-edge (ew!)
→ Ground-breaking

While, AI’s powerful. Innovative. It does hallucinate. 

AI’s not
→ Paul’s Waste Removal
→ Diane’s 911 Plumbing
→ Brad’s Pest Control

All what long-run investors and American households love: certainty.

No surprises, imagine this. 

Your spouse goes into labor, call 911 and, an ambulance pulls into your driveway. You rush, open the door, no one’s there. No EMT, nada. 

In a sales call, that’s what leading with AI looks like. 

- Cool
- Powerful
- Innovative
- Too good to be true

What could go wrong? That’s hard to answer. One easier way instead.

Know what interest our buyers 
See their end-to-end workflow
Show what fixes gaps they care about 

It worked for me sales, later in product marketing. Most surprising? 

Cool or not. People want what they know, works.

“They call it ‘The Big White House’” 
Our laughter betraying reality. 

“Ah Mom. Village can’t call it something else?” Because they really don’t know US. 

Especially if your hometown is Minneapolis. 
Not everything is as it seems. 

Chasing immigrants and citizens out of their homes, while my mom and I dwell in our respective homes, abroad. Tough. 

And that’s the small silver lining. 

Knowing my Mom can send me this pic, last week marveling at her new home, built in Liberia. 

Hearing villagers laugh in the background of our calls, grateful to see specter of American dream, in their own backyard. 

While watching ice swarm Minneapolis. 

Not everything is at it seems. Nah. Everyone just wants peace in a home — to call their own.

While biking home, it then hit me. Not a self-driving car. Yet the sheer impact felt no different. 

Green canopies, swept streets and, chatter I kinda understand (finally!). 

“Am I really building this abroad?”

Look. I’ve lived in Mexico City for 379 days. 

- No English system (they use metrics here)
- No burrito tours (that’s northern Mexico)
- No tequila shots (it’s 9am, Susan)

The vacation’s over. This is my new life, yo! 

And since it’s begun, what I building now, somehow mirrors it. 

- Google Translate does replace language guides.
- Reduce more guffaws and save face? Please! 
- Laugh with a local? C’mon, travel’s a gift.

But founders? When you fixate more on cool features, less on what your audience can see in day-to-day? 

We might overlook what they feel. I’ve done it before, and let me tell you. 

Potholes can even dwell in our sales process too. 

PS: No potholes can stop my grind, still walking 😂

No surprise here. We bit more PMA dry sandwiches, than we could chew. And now we must pay. 

With our first in-person banger! 

Ha ha. Dry sandwiches in a decrepit hotel hallway could never stop us. But real talk. 

Our accountant does think we're idiots. Especially for what I'm gonna say next:

If you're a software company who detests dry sandwiches at PMA summits, come and sponsors ours instead: 

https://lnkd.in/dz-XUm6A

Navattic's rocking with us. Who's next?

“How to audit websites for AEO?”
Here’s a simple and easy play to try:

→ Pick one audience avatar (rollerbladers)
→ Know their category (rollerblades)
→ Gather questions (narrow feet?)
→ Study website (schema?)
→ Cross-reference all

Here’s why. I was rollerblading in Condesa last night. 

Thinking about this EXACT post, ha I know. 
Almost every B2B website sells.

→ Testimonials
→ Product features
→ “Better way to do audits”
→ Interactive demos
→ Logo walls

They should sell upfront, direct!  
Giving answers your audience need.

Yours could mirror the company’s sales process. 

Think about it. And product marketers? 
That might not be a bad thing. 

A website built not only for AI, but gaps in your sales process. Because the worst sales guffaw, speaking firsthand sales? 

Build something dope, promote online, engaging Day 1 audience, getting excited, through virtual doors, when they finally ask:

”Why would I even rollerblade without rear-brakes?”

...and you can’t give a concrete answer. 

AEO, company website, or sales teams. Whatever camp you're on, “sales objections” are buying questions, hidden in your sales process. 

Maybe no objection-handing doc needed, after all. 
You could try this framework instead.

Talk to a few sales reps, ask what works. They could be ‘coin-operated’, willing to take any lead.

But when you ask... 
→ Who’s your favorite prospect to sell to? 
→ What have you seen to show for it? 
→ What interests them most? 
→ What’s your favorite thing to pitch?
→ How and what makes your job easier? 

You might see something you didn’t notice prior. 
A subtle pause, deeper look, new dots connected.

A website should sell. 
But if it’s not answering actual buyer questions.

Should we still blame ‘sales collateral usage’ in 2026?



Don’t do that, try this framework instead. 
Shoot me a DM if I can help.

taplio

The Battle

Dani Kellogg

Zach Roberts 💀

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The Battle

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Zach Roberts 💀

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