By Martin Beeby
Since 2010, I have worked in developer relations in different forms at three companies (Microsoft, Oracle, and AWS). I’ve worked in a number of different departments, including marketing, R&D engineering, and business development. I have a variety of management styles and many metrics and goals, each of which has different priorities and expectations.
When you put all of these roles together, you’ll find more similarities than differences. After combining your own experiences, share tips and advice on career survival and development in the developer relations area.
| 1. Every problem can be turned into a blog
As you work in developer relations, you will get a lot of questions from the outside. It could be about the company, so you’re representing your organization. If one person is really interested in asking you a question, there’s a good chance that a thousand other people will want to know the answer, and that’s where my blog comes from. If you receive an Email or DM asking you a question, you can write a blog post to answer the question, copy the link, and paste it to them in response.
Just now, you’ve turned 1-to-1 Engagement into 1-to-many interaction. That’s the key to scale. It doesn’t require much effort, but it makes everything you create more valuable.
| 2. Every piece of technology blog can be turned into an asset
Periodically review the most popular blogs and think about how to reuse them in other media formats. Can you make a video of it? Can you extend a series on this topic? Can you create a summary of the topic and present it to the meeting? Can you contact a podcast and talk about it on the show?
I call everything I create an asset. I call anything I do an activity. So, creating a speech is creating an asset; Giving this speech at an event is an event.
It mainly includes:
✅ Writing (blogs, whitepapers, documents, tutorials, product feedback, Q&A); ✅ video (live or recorded); ✅ Talks (lectures, webinars, events); ✅ audio (original or third party podcasts); ✅ code (tutorial, sample application);
In my workflow, blogging comes first, and you may find that video comes first for you, but the process should be the same. Take what hits you have and find new ways to use it. I call my blog my seed content. Seed content should be something you love to create, something that can be released quickly and with little friction. My personal blog is usually where I seed my content.
You may feel like you’re repeating yourself, which is a good sign. You know what you sell, but your audience doesn’t know much about it. Now most of the traffic is passing by. Only some of your audience are loyal subscribers, but the vast majority have never heard your talk or read anything you’ve created before.
A colleague once told me that his goal was to release one asset per day. It could be an answer on StackOverflow, a video, a blog post, a speech at a conference.
What you focus on creating will be guided by what you want to achieve, but this basic rule is a good one to follow, showing the world that you’re active and engaged and will attract people to help you build a network.
Personally, I post about 2-3 things a week. Sometimes this will be part of a larger plan, marketing campaign, or blog. In general, things that fit into the big picture and plan work better and are bigger.
At the end of the year, when I look back, there are often only 10 assets that have created real impact.
You might think it would be better to just focus on creating these 10 things that actually work. However, I have found that this is not the case, for three reasons:
✅ I think ideas that resonate usually don’t, and vice versa. There is no way to predict completely. It takes a lot of luck and skill; ✅ Unsuccessful content assets are the only way to create successful assets. You don’t have a hit if you don’t have 10 failures. ✅ These are not true failures, you can always learn something. Not every asset you create has to be viewed 50,000 times to be a success.
| 3. Write your speech at the beginning of this year
I will write 4-5 speeches in the first month of the New Year and try not to write any others for the next 11 months.
My speech was inspired by the following three things:
✅ Use successful cases as the basis for the presentation; ✅ Use Whitespace analysis to identify content gaps. This is often driven by marketing data or user feedback; ✅ Look at my goal sessions this year and think about what the organizers and audience would like to hear.
Over the course of a year, I’ll take the opportunity to refine and reframe and practice so that I’m really good at delivering this kind of speech.
I often arrive in the city the day before the meeting and feel the local culture through walking, so as to customize the content of the speech. I’m going to attach pictures of cities to the handout as a reference to points that already exist in my talk. I’ll use local users and solutions as examples, and I’ll take photos with previous speakers to reinforce the connection.
The idea came from one of my favorite British stand-up comedians, Eddie Izzard. When you look at his work, there seems to be a concept or an idea that comes to you in that moment. He rehearsed so well and prepared so well that many people thought he didn’t need to rehearse at all.
| 4. Create a speaker page
I have a speaker page that lists all the talks I’ve given so far, and then a few things for conferences and promotions, and I have a bio, a bio, a photo, and the pronunciation of my name.
A resume is essential and I recommend that you prepare an internal version as well. Colleagues will inevitably ask you what you’re up to. It is a good exercise to try to describe what you have done in about 100 words. Then have your boss review it for you. It’s also helpful to know what they expect of you.
| 5. Be a good writer
I’m dyslexic, but I find myself in a world that requires a lot of words. Over the years, I’ve been trying to improve my writing, but I’m still learning.
I take Courses to improve my Writing. My former employers all offer some level of training, but there are also excellent public resources online, such as Google’s Technical Writing Courses.
| 6. Be a good speaker
Public speaking is an area where I have improved greatly over the years. I’ve found that this is a skill you have to earn rather than learn. Others can help you in this process, but it’s all about the effort you put into your preparation and practice.
Two of my favorite books on The subject are Confessions of a Public Speaker and The Presentation Coach.
| 7. Keep the technical level
Write as much code as you can and get involved in the project. Even if you help a bug get into a recurring state, it helps to use the power of the technology to keep you in good shape.
If you want to get better at writing and speaking, as I mentioned in the two above, read a lot of other people’s tutorials and presentations, analyze what they’re doing, but also follow code examples. By paying attention to others, you can always learn something new, which will help you become an excellent writer and speaker.
| 8. Accept and embrace the marketing
Even if you are not in the Marketing Department, your function is most similar to that of marketing. Many people shudder when they hear this, because they often confuse marketing with advertising campaigns.
A good marketer is worth it because they study the marketing cycle of a product and have a complete set of academic tools and processes designed to understand and internalize user needs to make the product better.
Aligning with marketers and figuring out how to build scalable feedback loops is critical. Developer relationships are the links between product development and marketing strategies to meet user needs. I’ve found that good partnerships and relationships with marketing lead to greater impact.
| 9. Know your stakeholders
The job can be lonely, and you’re likely to be one of the smallest teams in the company. You may feel as if no one knows what you’re doing and, frankly, no one cares.
I find it useful to seek out your stakeholders outside of your immediate peers. Take some time to think about who in the organization needs to know what you’re doing and who has the time and resources to help you achieve your goals.
Your most valuable asset to other stakeholders is technical content creation and the voice of your users. These are all services that you can offer to your internal team, who in turn will often help you with budget, support, and resources.
| 10. Keep consistency with organization
I’m not a naturally organized person, but this job definitely requires it.
Building relationships internally and externally takes planning and time. Creating assets requires self-discipline and self-direction.
Creating an asset plan and writing down the goals you want to achieve during the year are two processes I go through at the beginning of each year. I tried to get my plan reviewed by stakeholders and my boss, and I was constantly revising it.
On a daily level, I use Todoist to keep track of what needs to be done. I like it because I can create tasks and Kanban at the same time, which suits the way I work.
I might write 10 blog posts in a week, but I might delay them, so I get 1 or 2 posts a week. This gives the impression, both outside and inside, that I am always busy. This is more effective than short bursts of strenuous activity and months of silence.
I spend time reviewing old content, updating it, reviewing it, and refactoring it. Because Google has never stopped recommending articles I wrote nearly a decade ago.
The last
Enjoy what you create and strive to align your personal goals with the goals of the company. If you really like your job, you will never have to work again. I’m on holiday every day because I love my job.
