One of my more popular blog articles from last year was about top questions that product managers should ask customers. (More on that here.) So I thought I’d write an update to that article on what I’ve learned since then and share a few other great questions product managers should be asking on a regular…
Whenever we are working on building a new product business there is always risk. The two most common categories are technology risk and market risk. Technology risk refers to whether or not is it possible to build our solution. Market risk depends on whether or not anyone wants to buy what we’ve built. I’ve said…
Since becoming popularized within the past few years, product-led growth (or PLG for short) has been popping up everywhere. I want to talk more about what it is, and more importantly, whether or not you and your product could stand to benefit from it. What is product-led growth? Product-led growth is a go-to-market strategy that…
You’ve determined the appropriate product-market fit, created a product that solves an unmet need for consumers, and launched it with great fanfare. Now is the time to pivot to growing your company. Focusing on increased sales is an obvious benchmark for measuring profits, but it’s not the only path to growth. One of the most…
Is my product in the alpha or beta stage? I get this question often and my answer is always the same – neither. Your product is always in production. I want to share a few reasons with you as to why I feel this is so important. A beta will slow you down Stop slowing…
There’s a lot to get excited about when starting a new product business. Many people get excited about all the amazing features they are going to build into their new awesome product. Unfortunately, this hype is really just a distraction from the goal we should be focusing on – finding product-market fit. I want to…
Market researchers have been using focus groups as a tool for over 60 years. While they can be useful in some instances, the epic failures of some products can be directly attributable to information gained through focus groups. The most famous product launch disaster is still – even after almost 35 years – the introduction…
Pivot is a frightening word in my line of work and from at least one angle it’s easy to understand why. Building a software product business is not just hard it can be incredibly expensive. It can cost a tremendous amount of time, money, energy, etc. This is why when the topic comes up, founders…
The misconception in product management is that fierce competition or one with seemingly high barriers to entry cannot be disrupted. This is a myth and we’re going to talk about the product company DuckDuckGo to prove it. For those that don’t know, DuckDuckGo is a search engine, just like Google. However, unlike Google, DuckDuckGo doesn’t…
Every business owner has goals for their company. Defining and quantifying goals for your business can be the difference between success and failure. Before you act, the best approach to create and adhere to objectives is by having KPIs. What are KPIs? A Key Performance Indicator is a measurable value that indicates how well a…