The CRO called both teams into a conference room: Revenue Operations and Product Marketing.
"We have a revenue execution problem," he said. "We're missing forecasts. Launches aren't hitting pipeline targets. Competitive win rates are declining. And I don't think either of your teams knows what the other is doing."
He pulled up data:
Product Marketing KPIs (my dashboard):
- Battle cards created: 12
- Sales training sessions delivered: 8
- Product launches completed: 4
- Content assets produced: 47
Revenue Operations KPIs (RevOps dashboard):
- Forecast accuracy: 86%
- Pipeline coverage: 3.2x
- Win rate: 43%
- Sales productivity: 78% of quota
"These dashboards have zero overlap," the CRO said. "PMM is measuring activity. RevOps is measuring revenue outcomes. You're not aligned on what success looks like."
He was right. PMM worked in our silo—creating content, running trainings, launching products. RevOps worked in their silo—managing pipeline, forecasting revenue, tracking sales performance.
We didn't have shared goals, shared metrics, or regular communication.
"Here's the mandate," the CRO said. "Build an alignment framework. Shared metrics you both own. Regular collaboration rituals. Integrated workflows. I want to see it in 60 days."
That conversation kicked off a three-month project to build a formal RevOps ↔ PMM alignment framework.
Here's exactly what we built and how we did it.
The Five Components of Our Alignment Framework
We organized the framework around five components:
- Shared Metrics Dashboard (what we both measure)
- Weekly Collaboration Rituals (when and how we sync)
- Data Access and Integration (what data each team shares)
- Joint Decision-Making Playbook (how we make cross-functional decisions)
- Tool Consolidation (eliminating system silos)
Component #1: Shared Metrics Dashboard
The Problem: PMM measured activity (content created, trainings delivered). RevOps measured outcomes (revenue, pipeline, win rates). We had no shared accountability.
The Solution: Build a dashboard with metrics both teams own jointly.
Shared Metrics We Chose:
1. Win Rate by Competitor
- RevOps responsibility: Track competitive deals in Salesforce, tag competitors, calculate win rates
- PMM responsibility: Build competitive positioning and battle cards that improve win rates
- Shared target: Maintain >55% win rate against top 3 competitors
2. Product Launch Pipeline Generation
- PMM responsibility: Run launch campaigns, create launch positioning, enable sales
- RevOps responsibility: Track pipeline attribution to launches, forecast expected pipeline
- Shared target: Each major launch generates $6M+ qualified pipeline within 90 days
3. Sales Ramp Time for New Enablement
- PMM responsibility: Create enablement content and training
- RevOps responsibility: Track time from training to first deal closed
- Shared target: <60 days median ramp time for new product enablement
4. Content Impact on Deal Outcomes
- PMM responsibility: Create sales enablement content (battle cards, case studies, ROI tools)
- RevOps responsibility: Track content usage in opportunities and correlation with win rates
- Shared target: Top 5 content assets show >10-point win rate improvement when used
5. Stage Conversion Health
- PMM responsibility: Build messaging and content for each funnel stage
- RevOps responsibility: Track stage-to-stage conversion rates
- Shared target: Maintain stage conversion within 5% of baseline
How this changed behavior:
Before shared metrics, PMM could declare "launch successful" based on training completion rates while RevOps saw the launch missed pipeline targets.
After shared metrics, success was defined jointly. A launch only succeeded if both PMM delivered enablement and RevOps tracked pipeline hitting target.
Neither team could claim success without the other.
Component #2: Weekly Collaboration Rituals
The Problem: PMM and RevOps only talked in quarterly business reviews—too infrequent to address issues before they impacted revenue.
The Solution: Build three recurring sync points at different frequencies.
Ritual #1: Weekly Pipeline & Competitive Sync (30 minutes, every Monday)
Attendees: PMM lead, RevOps lead
Agenda:
- 10 min: Pipeline health review (coverage, conversion rates, segment performance)
- 10 min: Win/loss patterns from past week (competitive intel, loss reasons, emerging threats)
- 10 min: Upcoming events (launches, pricing changes, territory shifts, market dynamics)
Output: At least one action item per meeting (e.g., "PMM to update Competitor X battle card by Friday" or "RevOps to reallocate pipeline coverage in healthcare segment")
Ritual #2: Monthly Metrics Review (60 minutes, first Monday of month)
Attendees: PMM team, RevOps team, Sales leadership
Agenda:
- 15 min: Shared metrics dashboard review (what's on target, what's off target)
- 20 min: Deep dive on worst-performing metric (root cause analysis)
- 15 min: Forecasting implications (how does current performance affect next quarter forecast)
- 10 min: Commitments (what each team will do to address issues)
Output: Written action plan with owners and deadlines
Ritual #3: Quarterly Strategic Planning (2 hours, week 1 of quarter)
Attendees: PMM, RevOps, Product, Sales, Marketing leadership
Agenda:
- 30 min: Prior quarter retrospective (what worked, what didn't, lessons learned)
- 45 min: Next quarter planning (launches, competitive priorities, market opportunities)
- 30 min: Resource alignment (where to invest PMM and RevOps time for max revenue impact)
- 15 min: Metric targets (set shared goals for next quarter)
Output: Quarterly alignment plan (priorities, metrics, resource allocation)
Why three rituals at different cadences:
- Weekly: Catch tactical issues before they become strategic problems
- Monthly: Ensure metrics are tracking to plan and adjust if not
- Quarterly: Set strategy and align resources to revenue priorities
Component #3: Data Access and Integration
The Problem: PMM couldn't access pipeline data without asking RevOps for exports. RevOps couldn't see competitive intelligence without asking PMM for summaries.
The Solution: Give each team access to the other's systems and data.
RevOps → PMM Data Access:
PMM gained direct access to:
- Salesforce reports: Pipeline by segment, win rates by competitor, stage conversion rates, deal cycle metrics
- Forecast models: Expected pipeline coverage, quota health by territory, at-risk pipeline
- Sales productivity dashboards: Ramp time, quota attainment, activity metrics
PMM → RevOps Data Access:
RevOps gained direct access to:
- Competitive intelligence platform: Competitor tracking, feature comparisons, pricing changes, market positioning updates
- Win/loss interview database: Coded loss reasons, competitive patterns, customer insights
- Sales enablement analytics: Content usage rates, training completion, battle card adoption
The Integration Layer:
We connected systems so data flowed automatically:
- Competitive intel platform → Salesforce (battle cards auto-surface in competitive opportunities)
- Sales enablement platform → Salesforce (content usage tracked in opportunity records)
- Win/loss data → Salesforce (loss reasons tagged automatically on closed-lost deals)
Why this mattered:
Before integration, analysis required manual data pulls:
- PMM: "Can you send me last quarter's win rate by competitor?"
- RevOps: "Can you share your win/loss interview notes for deals we lost to Competitor X?"
After integration, both teams could self-serve:
- PMM could pull real-time win rate data without asking
- RevOps could see competitive intelligence context without waiting for summaries
Reduced friction, faster insights.
Component #4: Joint Decision-Making Playbook
The Problem: When cross-functional decisions came up (e.g., "Should we delay this launch?" or "Should we deprioritize this segment?"), it was unclear who had authority and how to decide.
The Solution: Document decision-making frameworks for common scenarios.
Playbook Example #1: When to Delay or Cancel a Launch
Decision criteria:
- Pipeline coverage <3x? → Consider delay (RevOps assessment)
- Sales capacity <70% available bandwidth? → Consider delay (RevOps assessment)
- Positioning not differentiated vs. competitive alternatives? → Consider delay (PMM assessment)
- Product not ready for GA? → Mandatory delay (Product assessment)
Decision owner: PMM lead (with input from RevOps, Product, Sales)
Escalation: If PMM and RevOps disagree, CRO decides
Playbook Example #2: When to Deprioritize a Segment
Decision criteria:
- Win rate <35% for 2+ quarters? → Candidate for deprioritization
- ASP <50% of target segment average? → Candidate for deprioritization
- Sales cycle >30 days longer than average? → Candidate for deprioritization
- Retention rate <70%? → Candidate for deprioritization
Decision owner: RevOps lead (with input from PMM on positioning viability)
Escalation: If deprioritizing segment requires marketing budget reallocation, CMO + CRO decide jointly
Playbook Example #3: When to Build New Competitive Positioning
Decision criteria:
- New competitor appearing in >10% of deals? → Build positioning
- Win rate vs. existing competitor dropped >10 points in one quarter? → Update positioning
- Competitor feature launch creating deal risk >$2M? → Build response positioning
Decision owner: PMM lead (with RevOps providing win rate and pipeline data)
Timeline: New battle cards shipped within 15 days of trigger event
Why playbooks mattered:
Before: Cross-functional decisions were ad-hoc negotiations. Slow, political, unclear.
After: Clear criteria, clear owners, clear timelines. Decisions happened faster with less friction.
Component #5: Tool Consolidation
The Problem: PMM used 5 different tools. RevOps used 6 different tools. Only 2 overlapped. Data lived in silos.
The Solution: Consolidate on shared platforms where possible.
Consolidated Tools:
1. CRM (Salesforce):
- Both teams use as single source of truth for pipeline, deals, competitive tagging
- PMM publishes competitive intel directly into Salesforce
- RevOps tracks all opportunity progression and metrics
2. Sales Enablement Platform:
- PMM publishes all enablement content here
- RevOps tracks content usage and adoption metrics
- Integrated with Salesforce for opportunity-level content tracking
3. Competitive Intelligence Platform:
- PMM manages competitive tracking and battle cards
- RevOps has read access to competitive data
- Integrated with Salesforce to auto-surface battle cards in competitive deals
Retired/Consolidated Tools:
- PMM spreadsheets for launch tracking → Moved to project management tool integrated with Salesforce
- RevOps spreadsheets for pipeline analysis → Built Salesforce reports instead
- Separate win/loss databases → Consolidated into Salesforce with custom fields
Why consolidation mattered:
Before: PMM built a launch retrospective in Google Sheets. RevOps built pipeline reports in Excel. Neither could see the other's analysis.
After: Launch performance visible in real-time in Salesforce dashboards both teams accessed.
The Segment8 Discovery:
Late in our consolidation project, we discovered Segment8—a platform purpose-built for PMM and RevOps alignment.
What we'd spent 6 months building (competitive intel + sales enablement + launch tracking + CRM integration), Segment8 offered natively.
If I were building this framework today, I'd start with a platform like Segment8 rather than stitching together 5 separate tools.
Consolidated platforms reduce integration complexity and maintenance overhead.
What the Framework Actually Changed
Six months after implementing the alignment framework, measurable changes:
Forecast Accuracy:
- Before: 86% average
- After: 92% average
- Why: PMM competitive intelligence and market timing insights improved RevOps forecasts
Launch Pipeline Performance:
- Before: 60% of launches hit pipeline targets
- After: 85% of launches hit pipeline targets
- Why: Joint planning (RevOps capacity assessment + PMM positioning) prevented bad launch timing
Competitive Win Rates:
- Before: 43% average
- After: 51% average
- Why: Tighter collaboration on competitive intel → faster battle card updates → better sales enablement
Decision Speed:
- Before: Avg. 18 days to decide on cross-functional questions (delay launch, deprioritize segment, etc.)
- After: Avg. 6 days
- Why: Decision playbooks eliminated negotiation and ambiguity
Team Efficiency:
- Before: PMM spent 30% of time on manual data gathering and reporting
- After: PMM spent 12% of time on data work, 18% reallocated to high-impact content
- Why: Self-serve data access and integrated tools eliminated manual work
The Ongoing Maintenance Required
The framework isn't static. It requires maintenance:
Monthly:
- Review shared metrics (are targets still relevant?)
- Ensure rituals are happening (30-min Monday syncs actually occurring?)
- Check data integrations (are systems still syncing correctly?)
Quarterly:
- Update decision playbooks based on new scenarios encountered
- Assess tool consolidation (are there new tools creating silos?)
- Refresh metric targets based on business changes
Annually:
- Full framework review (what's working, what's not, what needs to evolve)
- Benchmark against best practices (are there new collaboration models to adopt?)
Without maintenance, frameworks decay. Rituals get skipped. Metrics lose relevance. Tools proliferate again.
Assign ownership: One person from PMM, one from RevOps, joint accountability for framework health.
How to Build This at Your Company
If you're starting from scratch, here's the roadmap:
Month 1: Establish Shared Metrics
- Pick 3-5 metrics both teams genuinely co-own
- Build initial dashboards
- Set baseline targets
Month 2: Launch Weekly Rituals
- Start with just the 30-minute Monday sync
- Prove value before adding monthly or quarterly meetings
- Document agenda and outputs
Month 3: Connect Data Systems
- Give PMM access to key RevOps reports
- Give RevOps access to PMM competitive intel and win/loss data
- Build one high-value integration (e.g., competitive intel → Salesforce)
Month 4: Document Decision Playbooks
- Identify 3 most common cross-functional decision points
- Write criteria and decision owners
- Test and refine
Month 5-6: Tool Consolidation Assessment
- Audit: How many tools are each team using?
- Identify consolidation opportunities
- Consider platform solutions vs. point tool integrations
Don't try to do all five components at once. Start with shared metrics and weekly sync. Build momentum. Add components as you prove value.
The Uncomfortable Truth
Building RevOps ↔ PMM alignment required both teams to give up control.
PMM had to let RevOps challenge positioning decisions based on win rate data.
RevOps had to let PMM influence forecasts based on competitive intelligence.
Both teams had to accept shared accountability—we succeed together or fail together.
The framework worked because leadership mandated it and both teams committed.
But if either team had resisted—held onto their silos, refused to share data, or skipped collaboration rituals—it would've failed.
Alignment isn't about frameworks and metrics. It's about trust.
The framework just makes trust operational.