Product Management In 5 minutes (Part 3)

All Products start from somewhere like every other concept in life, all that we see and use as a product was initially a vision or idea, a need or requirement that was brought to life and acted upon consistently to become what it is.

As product managers, we are sometimes under the impression or perceived as the “Idea” person, well that’s very far from the truth of a product manager, we are actually not the Idea person but the reformer and fine-tuner of the influx of Ideas and requirements of other people(such as clients, sales or marketing team, even the product team) by sieving out the bad ideas from the good, and deciding when it is best to actualize the ideas and requirements, given the factors at the time in the corporation/company, the clients/user needs, the products industry, and technological phase. And having stated that fact I would put you through briefly on how to be the right Product manager as regards Ideas and user needs.

So, where do ideas come from?

As product managers, our job revolves around what to do next and it requires lists of features to build, and being able to decide what is most important and best, which brings about the question, where is the top of the funnel for a product manager in terms of what to build?

Having known that feature Ideas, requirements, and requests spring up from everywhere, we as product managers need to collect and organize these ideas, and that is the top of the funnel for we product managers. Now there are various methods of doing this but I organize according to the four most essential places ideas can come from which are Employees, Metrics, Users, and clients (E.M.U.C).

Employee-based ideas come from everyone within the corporation or organization contributing to the product, Metric-based ideas are gotten from problems or inefficiencies we find when looking into how the product is being used by the user. User-based ideas are gotten from user feedbacks either through forums, emails, or social media. While Client-based ideas are gotten from the feedbacks of the clients.

Yes, users and clients are most of the time not the same because the term clients primarily exist in the business-to-business phase (b2b) which is a type of product management role, we as well have the business-to-consumer phase (b2c) which is where the term users exist, and we have the internal tools phase where the employee-based ideas are most relevant.

Getting the actual user needs

The real user needs are requirements that add value to a product, service, or environment for a user. This is why as a Product manager that has honed the product management mindset we have to understand the real problems and core pain points behind what people ask us to do.

So, to do this we have to find a solution to a problem instead of trying to fit a problem to a solution this way you can avoid unintended side effects, a simple but effective trick I use is the triple why effect this is when I ask why three times to whichever party I am getting the idea requirement from in an engaging and understanding manner, this would help get to the root of the actual problem or reason, just ask why.

First Why

The idea requirement should not be simply intuitive assumptions as to the problem the product should solve. As practice shows, however great your solution might be, it is doomed to failure if it solves a wrong problem.

To avoid this doom we should ask a “Why” that would define the problem and identify the focal user problem.

Second Why

This “Why” tests and weighs the thesis (focal user problem) gotten from the first why by digging deep into their assumptions and challenging them into revealing the true user problem.

Third Why

To confirm the thesis this “Why” validates the real user needs insight.

After getting user needs

We have defined and studied the real user needs all that is left is to reach a consensus with the product team and then build and test the prototype solutions before release.

Conclusion

Ensure to take your time when defining the user needs of your product so as to make a product that will be useful for users, and therefore, financially successful. Also, note that there’s a difference between users and customers as a b2b product manager.
All the functionality of your product should be fully user-centered or provide a specific benefit for the user.
I expect questions for clarification. In the next part, we would look into competitive and market analysis.