Analyst Relations Sr. Manager

Are you ready to power the World's connections?

If you don’t think you meet all of the criteria below but are still interested in the job, please apply. Nobody checks every box - we’re looking for candidates that are particularly strong in a few areas, and have some interest and capabilities in others.

About the role:

Kong is looking for an experienced analyst relations manager with a deep understanding of the industry analyst landscape and focused experience with the API market and related analysts. In this role, you will own and develop Kong’s analyst relations program and drive the execution of the company’s AR strategy by partnering with key stakeholders across our product, office of CTO and product marketing teams to deliver results. As the first Analyst Relations professional at Kong, you will play a key role in shaping how we execute, measure and ultimately build a nimble, effective, and impactful AR function that matches Kong’s unique business model.

You’ll be part of a global product marketing team, reporting to the Head of Product Marketing to stay abreast of everything product, platform, and technology related and partnering with corp. communications, product, CTO Office and other teams across the business to strengthen and deepen Kong’s relationship with analysts.

The core of this role is to develop and implement an analyst relations program to support communications and marketing initiatives with analyst research and industry validation including timely updates, analyst inquiry, research services, and field education programs.

Why should you want to work at Kong?

Market Opportunity - We are on a quest to build a $10b+ software company over the next few years and need YOUR help!

Why APIs Matter? APIs have been enabling innovation for decades!

Strong VC team, Series D, strong year over year revenue growth!

Technical Leadership - We are recognized as the leader in innovation in the connectivity space.

Marco, our CTO/co-founder - “We are the Cisco of L4 and L7” - CUBE Conversation, March 2021

We are the leading innovator in the connectivity space!

Amazing Team & Culture - Come be a "Konger" and find out what we mean.

Great Place to Work Certified in 2020 & 2021

Kong employees exemplify our culture at our 2022 Sales Kickoff

2022 Forbes Cloud 100 Honoree

Building Great Products - Learn why the world's largest companies love our tech!

Kong Named in the Leaders Quadrant of the Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for API Management for the Fourth Consecutive Year

Over 250m+ downloads of our open source API gateway! Over 40k+ stars on Github between Kong API and Kong Insomnia!

Key responsibilities include:

• Create, nurture, and manage positive relationships with industry analysts, serving as a key, centralized contact point and connector.
• Work with designated product marketing managers and product teams to execute an AR program that influences, educates, and secures endorsements from leading analysts in our most important topic areas.
• Develop and implement an analyst relations program to support communications and marketing initiatives with analyst research and industry validation including timely updates, analyst inquiry, research services, and field education programs.
• Act as an advisor on how the analyst firms can contribute to marketing campaigns and internal understanding of the markets and competitors.
• Manage a data-driven and measurement-rich analyst relations program including:
• Maintaining an analyst knowledge base that tracks the most relevant and influential global analysts, strategic research reports, and their interactions with global media, financial markets, and customers.
• Monitoring analyst research agenda and coverage, and creating a forward-looking research and engagement calendar.
• Cataloging research and our responses to serve as a history, learning reference, and reliable source of curated research responses.
• Project managing, preparing submissions and presentations, and assisting with contributed stories, press releases, quotes, and case studies.
• And any additional challenges and tasks to help support Kong’s growth.

Requirements:

• Excellent written, communication, and verbal skills
• Dynamic, creative, and entrepreneurial mindset
• 5+ years of marketing experience in a Analyst relations role
• Technical skills set to quickly ramp up on Kong’s API platform and be able to articulate its value to analysts during all interactions.
• Strong program management skills to manage and orchestrate several stakeholders across the organization when responding to complex questionnaires from analysts (i.e Gartner MQ)
• Self-motivated, ambitious, and autonomous individual who excels at collaborating with others to achieve and exceed results.

Kong has different base pay ranges for different work locations within the United States, which allows us to pay employees competitively and consistently in different geographic markets. Compensation varies depending on a wide array of factors, including but not limited to specific candidate location, role, skill set and level of experience. Certain roles are eligible for additional rewards including sales incentives depending on the terms of the applicable plan and role. Benefits may vary depending on location. US based employees are typically offered access to healthcare benefits, a 401(k) plan, short and long term disability benefits, basic life and AD&D insurance, among others. The typical base pay range for this role in the US is $150,000 - 178,000.

What is a Konger?

We are a group of makers, thinkers, and doers focused on helping today’s developers build tomorrow’s technology. Our teams work on the bleeding edge of API innovation to provide our users with a central nervous system for data and services.

We put design at the heart of everything we do, and we’re relentlessly focused on creating beautiful experiences for our customers. That’s why technology companies, major banks, e-commerce innovators, and government agencies put Kong in front of their most important web applications.

We believe in the power of Open Source and everything it stands for. That’s why developers around the world enthusiastically contribute on top of our open-source platform.

We are passionate about solving challenges that will fundamentally shape the future of technology, and we’re looking for the right people to join us on our mission. If you believe in taking ownership of your work, making an impact, and having fun along the way, we would love to talk to you.

Kong Core Values:

We are CUSTOMER CHAMPIONS. Customers are everything, we put them at the center of everything we do. We are all empowered to make an impact.

We are OWNERS. We are drivers, not passengers and own the quality and outcomes of our work.

We are UNSTOPPABLE. We work with purpose, obsession, and grit. It takes muscle to do hard things and doing hard things builds muscle.

We are REAL. We are genuine, principled, and confident without arrogance. Show respect and kindness, especially in tough moments.

We Are ACCELERATORS. We prioritize speed, iteration, and results.

We are GLOBAL. We work together from anywhere to achieve our common goals. Our differences make us stronger.

We are EXPLORERS. We value ideas over hierarchy. Never accept the status quo. We make bold bets, fail, and learn everyday. There is always a way.

About Kong:

Kong is THE cloud native API platform with the fastest, most adopted API gateway in the world (over 300m downloads!). Loved by developers and trusted with enterprises’ most critical traffic volumes, Kong helps startups and Fortune 500 companies build with confidence – allowing them to bring solutions to market faster with API and service connectivity that scales easily and securely.

83% of web traffic today is API calls! APIs are the connective tissue of the cloud and the underlying technology that allows software to talk and interact with one another. Therefore, we believe that APIs act as the nervous system of the cloud. Our audacious mission is to build the nervous system that will safely and reliably connect all of humankind!

For more information about Kong, please visit konghq.com or follow @thekonginc on Twitter.

We are an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability or veteran status.