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Why should my CMO love APIs?

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Kristopher Kleva edited this page Aug 16, 2013 · 31 revisions

Convener

Kristopher Kleva (@klevland)

Attendees

Attendees

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Notes

I recently asked the API-Craft community this question about why a Chief Marketing Officer would find API development, management and monetization important. This session was conducted as a face-to-face mind mapping exercise.

Original Question:

APIs mean a lot of different things to different roles in the enterprise. This often exposes the question about who or why key business stakeholders should be on board with your API program.

Considering this I think of leaderships at the c-level and how should ultimately have the most skin in the game.

The CIO? - Yes, of course this is a given. CIO's would be have a deep stake in the outcome of the API program. One of the key assumptions I made about APIs is that they are driven by the infrastructure needs of the business to foster connections within and external to the company. Naturally, chief information offers are the most aware of the value of these connections and thus priority they hold within their portfolios.

But what about the CMO? What does he care about API products, proxies, composition, mediation, etc? How does the API program directly affect the success of this office and direct reports?

This is probably obvious to most API evangelists... but I'd like to here the communities perceptive.

Thanks! Kris

Why should my CMO love APIs? API Value Mind Map

Apis provide value. The following mind map is a group attempt at describing the value of your API program to Marketing executives. The keyword in the map is value. The group immediately came to consensus here.

Branching from Value we arranged the following. These nodes appear to represent keywords used when illustrating the value of APIs from a Marketing perspective.

provide value because:

  • Developers - the make the user experience come to life on any device, anywhere, and at any time using a massive collection of languages, tools, design patterns to do so. Developers come from all walks of life, speak different languages and have received various levels of education. Developers provide value to the CMO because they provide the human resources to construct marketing requirements into working software. Developers add value... and your CMO loves them.

Sam Ramji once mentioned in a talk, "Why do you care about developers? Because they’re your new channel and they’re core propulsion" (Correlating Developers as dogs used for the core propulsion of Roald Amundsen to the south pole 100 years ago).

Developers provide value because they are the core propulsion of your business.

Some key ways the group thought are great ways to pamper the developers pushing their business forward was through Hackathons. A hackathon (also known as a hack day, hackfest or codefest) is an event in which computer programmers and others involved in software development, including graphic designers, interface designers and project managers, collaborate intensively on software projects.[1]

  • Exploration
  • Vendor Requirements
  • Revenue
  • Risk
  • Key Performance Indicators
  • Flexibility
  • Brand
  • Innovation
  • Distribution Channels
  • Time to Market
  • Cost Avoidance
  • Vendor Requirement - Vendors can more easily integrate to meet business service level and data requirements. Service levels can measures the performance of a system by defining goals and the percentage to which those goals should be achieved.
  • Exploration -
  • Developers -
  • Flexibility -
  • Brand - Extend your Brand by enforcing design and/or integration guidelines reducing risks incurred by unsanctioned scraping.
  • Innovation - APIs can foster innovation by supporting business incubation programs designed to support the successful development of entrepreneurial companies through an array of business support resources and services, developed and orchestrated by incubator management and offered both in the incubator and through its network of contacts.
  • Innovation - May position you as a thought leader recognizing you as an authority in a specialized field and whose expertise is sought and often rewarded.
  • Distribution Channels - APIs can create new distribution channels. Allowing the Brand or Enterprise to become "Programmable" expanding the reach of your product and/or services.
  • Time to Market - Get out into the market faster creating a competitive advantage by developing an attribute or combination of attributes that allows you outperform competitors.
  • Cost Avoidance -
  • Key Performance Indicators -
  • Risk Management - Without an API, people will find unofficial points of integration that you have no control over, e.g. screen scraping. Better to have people "inside the tent"
  • Revenue -
  • Discovery - Once you offer an API you create the opportunity for 3rd parties to creatively bring value in unexpected ways.

Key Points

  1. They are the business of highlighting value. Apis provide value.

  2. Because there is nothing worse than missing out out on a trend.

  3. APIs (in some form or another) have historically enabled multiple distribution channels.

  4. Providing APIs can transition a traditional web site into a platform.

  5. They are in the business attracting new customers or leads.

  6. To bind or lock-in existing customers better providing service integration they are less likely to switch.

  7. API consumers are likely different than the rest of your customer base, but have a powerful multiplying effect.

  8. Because you don't want to get your lunch eaten by a competitor who did a fantastic job of reaching out to this segment and engaging them as customers.

  9. Because the value of your product and/or service increases with the number of tools people can use with it.

  10. The API is a means of building long-term customer relationships.

  11. Puts you on the radar of technical people by sponsoring hackathons, writing technical papers, producing technical content.

  12. Customers who integrated our APIs have stayed customers for longer on average and compared to non-integration customers.

  13. Building a community of developers around our API will function as a sales multiplier in our market.

  14. Creates a software halo around our core system that complements the out-of-the-box functionality.

  15. Enables collaboration with integration partners (who rely on our API) in niche markets that we would not address by ourselves cost/benefit-wise

  16. Provides marketing with a new target audience - the integration developer to market the product and/or service and the complementing API.

  17. Conveys a message to end customers that you are committed to meet their specific needs and are satisfied with a leading system and a smart integration

The impetus for creating APIs for an existing product can be entirely of a marketing nature (sometimes championed by engineering, but always from a marketing-as-perceived-by-engineering slant):

  • This would be useful?
  • People would use it and be happier?
  • People will pay for this, or buy our core product in greater numbers?

Do's and Don'ts when pitching APIs:

  1. Never tell anyone "they don't get it"… because they may understand the concepts using different nomenclature. Providing APIs are sometimes represented as "Turning your site into a Platform".

  2. Don't debate the value or impact to the Brand with marketing. They are the SME in this area.

  3. Don't overdose on the technical terminology.

  4. Replace the API acronym with what it enables.

  5. API must not be solely the domain of the developer evangelist, CMO needs to be in on this, but your dev evangelist / API support team should be their shepherd

  6. Be aware of the customer segment actually consuming your APIs. But don't over do it

  7. Be aware of the customer segment actually building (or just using) the applications on top of or integrating with your API.

  8. Ideal use case is to provide a comprehensive product and/or service including an API, not just a pure API.

Use cases

  • Dropbox and Twitter (before it changed tactics) grew because of third-party integrations
  • Nike created Nike+ to prevent user for scraping content
  • IBM Rational Software creates API into products to extend functionality

Links

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackathon

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