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Comment by sho | Hacker News Reader

One of these newly-hired Product Managers should take a couple minutes out of their no doubt busy day to look at what I can only assume is their main product, the web site:

- the site took 23 seconds (!) to load

- all content is hidden below the fold, with just some kind of animation visible. I assumed for a long time that the page was not loading. Nope - it's just not visible until (if) the reader scrolls down

- after a couple of refreshes, the user is treated to a modal imploring them to sign up for a newsletter: "You love us. You really love us!" no I don't

- there is also an email form at the bottom begging for subscriptions. There is a JS dismiss button that doesn't work

Actually, considering the above, I am not sure anyone should take Braze's advice about hiring product managers.

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In most of companies the marketing website is run by the marketing team.

Also in most of those companies the marketing team doesn't talk with the product team, as a result the marketing content has nothing to do with the actual product

That's still not a company I'd been keen to work for. I'd rather work for a company where the Product Managers at least create the content for the website if not actually run it.

Eh, as a Product Manger I have more important things to worry about and you most likely are not the customer I would be targeting if I worked for a company like Braze.

Looks like they do direct sales which makes things like loading the website and "below the fold" significantly less important. Their focus is on lead generation so they can get sales folks talking directly to whoever the buyer persona at the company.

Source: I'm a PM at mid-size enterprise software company with 6 1/2 years experience.

Well, I don't know what other people do, but personally I do check the company's website before (preferably) or after the visit of a salesman from that company.

The way the site is made, if it feels like "just marketing hype", it does contribute (I agree with not-so-much-relevance) to the opinion I form on the company and/or the product (not unlike as it was the case once for the business card, from the way it is printed, the material, the titles given to the person before you, etc. you can derive some indicators).

I have yet to work for a company in which the PMs would let anything like that exist out of their influence, lol.

Their actual web application UI is just as bad.

amazing product managers often have their hands tied because of shitty higher-management, and rather than improving product they're stuck navigating the internal-political-hell.

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