Product management is the function that shapes all the stages of a product’s life cycle. It deals with the overall development of a product. The scope of product management is quite wide.Â
A product manager manages the product’s progress right from the initial phase of development until the time it reaches the customers. Hence we can see that delivering successful products goes beyond the scope of developers. Strong insight into the business, understanding of smooth user experience, and a clear vision are needed to deliver a product.Â
The main aim of product management is to make sure that the voices of customers are heard. Products with better performance and impact are delivered only if there is a strong focus on customers.Â
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Product Management Process
The scope of product management is huge, and it plays an integral role in building a product. The main question that arises is how to plan a roadmap for your product to ensure growth in business and meet customer needs. Let us determine the main steps involved in the product management process to bring the best possible product.
1. Ideate to innovate
In the first phase of the product management process, ideas are collected from around the organization and nurtured to solve existing problems.Â
- Ideas from team members: The most innovative product ideas come from business employees and staff. Crowdsourcing is an effective way to collect relevant ideas from the team to build a product roadmap.
- Having brainstorming sessions: Members from diverse groups ranging from the marketing team to the development team sit together and produce many ideas. The feasibility of the ideas is discussed later.
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2. Assessing product requirements and evaluating the market need
The product requirements provide you with an idea of what resources are needed to build the product. In this phase, you can find the answers to what sort of product is being built and the reason for building the product. An analysis of the market needs and customer persona is done to evaluate whether the product will have a high demand after launch.Â
All the use cases of the product are listed next. The initial scoping of development cost is then calculated, followed by developing a metric for measuring success. Â
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3. Preparing a roadmap
The product roadmap lets you know where your product stands, where you want to see it in the future, and the steps needed to reach its destination. Product managers frequently update the roadmaps based on market changes and internal issues. A product roadmap covers the business strategy, the product’s objectives, and the priority listing of events to complete all the objectives.
4. Setting priorities and delivering to the market.
In this phase, product managers decide on the best time to build each portion of the product. The decision is based on the value brought to the user and product by that portion. The core of the product is usually built first. Product managers then work closely with the marketing, support, and engineering teams to ensure all the features are of the highest quality.
Read:Â Product Manager Salary in India
5. Statistical analysis
You should set Key Point Indicators or KPIs to check if the proposed changes to a product have been successful. A close look at the set of customers having maximum engagement with your product will help you target a specific customer set.Â
For instance, suppose you have a product mainly used by people from India between the ages of 20-30. You can have specific advertisements for this specific set of people. Knowing the group of people revisiting your product page and retaining loyal users is essential.Â
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6. Feedback from customers
You should be open to criticisms and modify features that are not liked by customers. Before launching the final product, you can use wireframes to let your customers know about the product vision. Collecting feedback from customers belonging to diverse professions helps you better understand the flaws in your product.
Also Read: Product Management Learning Path: A Comprehensive Career Guide
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Wrapping up
The scope of product management is rising each day. You are now aware of the product management process and a product manager’s role in delivering a successful product.
If you are highly intrigued by what you read, you can enrol in the Post Graduate Certificate in Product Management offered by upGrad. The certification program delivered by experts will help you kickstart your career to be a successful product manager.
Q1. What is the salary of product managers in India?
The product manager plays a vital role in steering an organization to success; they are in huge demand across various industries. Product companies are always looking for efficient and smart product managers. They also offer lucrative salaries to candidates with the right expertise and sufficient experience. The earnings of a product manager in India usually range between INR 5 lakhs and INR 35 lakhs a year. On average, product managers make approximately INR 16 lakhs a year. The average salary of product managers will vary on certain factors like the overall work experience of the professional, their skillset, and location, among others.
Q2. Can a product manager become the COO?
A product manager is in charge of commercializing products for the company such that it becomes a saleable item that consumers will like. To make the product saleable, the product manager must be good at gauging the pain points of the consumers so that the product can be designed and developed to meet their needs effectively. They are also responsible for supervising the overall product development project and possess business acumen, managing product roadmaps, project costs, and product positioning. In many aspects, the product manager functions similar to the chief operating officer of a company. So with enough work experience and expertise, product managers can transition into the COO role.
Q3. What makes an excellent product manager?
Considering the fact that a product manager has a varied range of tasks to perform, they need to possess diverse skills to be efficient. Product managers have to have the right balance of a variety of skills to handle different areas of responsibility efficiently. They should have the right balance of strategic and tactical skills and also be both firm and flexible with their teams. They must be intuitive and follow and make sense out of real evidence, like market data, user feedback, etc., gathered at every step. Product managers must also sharpen their research and analytical skills.
