Proactive vs Reactive DevRel Strategies @jessicaewest, Algolia

“The best offense is a good defense”

However, defense is the not necessarily the best offense in DevRel

Who am I? Jessica West
 @jessicaewest
 @jesswest
 me@jesswe.st
 jesswe.st

The shiny toy effect

The game of risk

Conferences

The game of DevRel

You need to: Stay technical Write content Manage events

If you aren’t proactive with your strategies, your team will fail.

I interviewed a few industry folks…

“We focused heavily on reactive work due to a lack of tools and resources to be more proactive.”

“… the DevRel team was not specifically being measured. Those were measurements we maintained and reported, but weren’t held accountable to.”

What do reactive strategies look like?


{re·ac·tive} : acting in response to a situation rather than creating or controlling it

Reactive Approach

Reactive Approach Engineering / Product … be experts with the API and be able to explain all features … create community projects … create high-quality apps and demos that show off the API … take support shifts once a month … contribute to the documentation …. collect product feedback Marketing … lead the charge on our technical content … review content for developer-friendliness … use their networks to promote content … use their networks to get attendance for our events … go to meetups and conferences in their areas of expertise … go events outside their area of expertise and serve in a mentoring capacity to others who are there … monitor the health of our developer brand and whether we’re creating enough goodwill in the community … know which conferences and hackathons to sponsor … manage and build key individual relationships in the community … help the company reach and win over developer influencers … get community members to share their projects … create and moderate places for the community to gather Sales / SE … create sales collateral … help outbound strategic accounts … participate in pre-sales activities … create upsell opportunities to customers they know Culture … own and enforce the code of conduct … help us hire a more diverse team Industry / External … know everything about their company’s API and their vertical(s) … be publicly visible, accessible and available (online and offline) … share what they’re learning back to the DevRel community …. do technical support for their API … have a firm grasp of emerging technologies … be embedded in communities other than their own … hold their company accountable to the community and the industry … speak to journalists and analysts

The problem: Oooo, shiny!

Evangelism? Advocacy? Community? Clown Juggling?

What if your company wants it all? Too much!

Budget cuts are real

What do proactive strategies look like?

{pro·ac·tive} : creating or controlling a situation by causing something to happen rather than responding to it after it has happened

You must define what DevRel means for your company

What is DevRel to you? Drop Ship Evangelism Code Advocate Community Champion All the above

Drop Ship Evangelism*

“Drop ship evangelism is a sign of a new team, one that may not know where to focus yet.”

“Many evangelism programs are still trying to prove themselves; its hard to have those 6-8 touch points with a drop ship way of running the program.”

“…only works when you have a big team that allows one person to focus on that travel and follow up. You need different functions of engagement (multiple touch points), email with blog post link”

Evangelism is a triangle In Words In Person In Code

3 C’s “If you don’t have a way to reach developers, your Developer Relations program isn’t worth much.” Community ◎ Code ◎ Content

Create code and content, the community will come.

“It’s the repetition [the multiple touch points] that gets developers to understand your product.”

Proactive Approach Define team quarterly objectives and deliverables Define individual contributor objectives and deliverables Retrospective on deliverables and metrics seen Iterate on approaches

Retrospectives

Iteration and Adaptation

We are failing each other and our companies without a proactive approach

Strategize your approach

{strat·e·gy} : a plan of action or policy designed to achieve a major or overall aim

DevRel Bill of Rights A clear set of business goals A well-defined place in the organization A structured way to impact product or platform Open lines of communication to marketing The right tools specifically designed for the job Explicit ethical and social guidelines Support for building inclusive communities Clear distinction from sales engineering Ongoing resources for professional development Connection to a community of peers

Get buy-in or support from an executive

“For 6 months, the developer advocacy program reported into the CTO. They saw the value in travel, but had other primary concerns.”

“Due to the lack of realization in the hierarchy of needs, we weren’t able to address their chief concerns as they related to community engagement.”

Metrics vs impact * metrics don’t always tell the story of impact * impact is not necessarily a function of time or effort

+ + = Email Hack: sent to an email with a budget in subject line; receive the best value from the Taco Bell menu! Massive success!

+ + =

We must be militant in our strategies in order to succeed

British general Wellington: "I used to say of him (Napoleon) that his presence on the field made the difference of 40,000 men.”

“One must change one's tactics every 10 years if one wishes to maintain one's superiority …”

Napoleon would’ve killed it in DevRel

Taking calculated risks in DevRel can be strategic

Tech-Napoleans Strategies Early Twilio and SendGrid Hackathon Presence SendGrid accelerator support program Clarifai Champions GitHub Student Pack Algolia donations instead of swag Glitch pioneering different way of collaborative coding

The French Army recognizes three principles to be applied to operation of land forces at the tactical level

Freedom of Action

Unity of Effort

Economy of Means

TL;DR

Step 1: Proactive Approach Step 2: ??? Step 3: Profit (we keep our jobs!)

Summary Multiple customer touch points for success
 Buy in from at least one executive 
 Clearly defined strategy
 Iteration and Adaptaion
 Surround yourself with SMTP *Smart Motivated Talented Persons

Come hang at Karaoke with me later! Thank you!