Internal Product Strategies a Product Manager Must Consider
Product managers play a strategic role, according to consultancy Pragmatic Marketing. They have a dual responsibility -- to manage the development of new and existing products and to take those products to market within the guidelines of various internal product strategies. From a product perspective they must consider a company's platform strategy, its future product roadmap strategy and the product life cycle. Product strategy is itself driven by marketing strategy, aligning customer needs with product features.
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Roles
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Product consultants the 280 Group differentiate the roles of product marketing and product management by perspective. The product management role, they say, is inbound, working with engineers and customers to bring customer-focused products to market. Product marketing is outbound, ensuring that products are launched and marketed effectively to the target market. Depending on the size of the company, the two roles can be combined or separate.
Platform
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Companies that produce different versions of a core product for individual markets and customer segments manage their product designs using a platform strategy. The platform strategy reduces research and development effort and enables streams of products to be launched on the underlying platform. This approach also helps to control development and manufacturing costs when compared with producing a new version for each market. Product managers must take account of a platform strategy when they are planning new products or enhancements to existing products.
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Roadmap
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A product roadmap strategy sets out the company's future direction for product development. The roadmap may be based on a platform strategy, developing future products on a common platform. Alternatively, the roadmap may set out proposals for new products that take advantage of emerging technologies or new, advanced materials. The roadmap gives product managers and other parties involved in product development a set of guidelines that coordinates their individual activities.
Marketing
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A company's marketing strategy sets the requirements for product strategy by translating customer needs and challenges into product specifications. In some cases, marketing strategy might identify a need to improve existing products to meet competitive challenges or declining customer satisfaction levels. Marketing strategy might also require new products to meet changing customer needs or new market opportunities. Product managers must take account of both market and product strategies in developing their product plans.
Cycle
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Any product development decisions must take account of the product life cycle -- the stages a product goes through from initial launch through rapid sales growth to a point where sales decline. The four stages are introduction, growth, maturity and decline. Companies invest different levels of marketing or product development funding at each stage to maintain profitability. Product managers may decide to develop new features during a product's growth and maturity stages. However, investing in a product with declining sales is a waste of resources. The emphasis must be on developing a new product.
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