I’m about to launch a website. Any advice?
“I’m about to launch a website selling scotch whisky. Can you offer any advice?”
Tag: problem
45: Three ways you’re DEFINITELY doing MVPs wrong
If one were to heft a half-brick down Old Street in London, there would be high probability of hitting someone currently engaged in building a minimum viable product (MVP) of some sort or another. There’s also almost as high a probability that they’re doing it wrong. Allow me to explain.
33: The “Field Of Dreams” is fiction
This is not “Field Of Dreams” and you’re not Kevin Costner. If you build it, the users will not come – unless they have a strong motivation to do so.
Why sales needs to align with product management to win more business
Despite relying on each other for the success of their products, the Sales and Product teams often have a jarring relationship. This is far from ideal. By looking at where things go wrong we can identify a better way of working with each other. The prizes on offer: shorter sales cycles, more easily achieved targets and customers who are always happy to hear from you.
16: You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone – Joni Mitchell
People value something most when they’ve just lost it or come close to doing so. If your product prevents this happening, take some advice from Joni Mitchell: you need to save your client the heartache of loss by helping them remember how much they value what they have now so that they don’t take it for granted.
Drowning in product documentation? Start swimming – Part 1
Do you spend more time writing documents about your product than actually managing it?
Many companies with some kind of product management function become all caught up in the process, drowning themselves in increasing numbers of documents. These rapidly become overwhelming to manage, contain duplicated detail and ultimately obscure the real objective of product management, namely to create successful products.
5: The best possible way may not necessarily be the right way
We product managers are a surprisingly upbeat bunch considering that we seem to spend a good proportion of our time making compromises. We very rarely get the opportunity to deliver everything we need in a product in the best possible way.
3: Know your subject matter
So much of being a product manager depends on successfully persuading and influencing others. Whether you’re presenting your product strategy, presenting a business case to the Board or talking with your customers, you need to know your subject matter: to demonstrate a good knowledge of your products and market to ensure that you come over as authoritative and credible.
2: Find problems rather than guess solutions
When we start thinking about the requirements for a new product version, I bet we all make the same mistake when deciding what goes in: we guess solutions rather than find problems.
The thorny issue of pricing
Ah, pricing. Always a thorny topic for product managers as it’s one those more subjective areas of the job. I’d love to have some kind of oracular spreadsheet that foresees how much customers would be willing to pay for my new product. Ironically, I would pay good money for such a thing…
