Prioritization is critical for any product manager. Proper rice prioritization can help drive the success of a product while the wrong prioritization could kill it.
The Following Are 5 Essential Questions To Ask When Prioritizing Your Next Product Feature:
1- Who Are My Users?
Understanding who you are building the software for is important in creating a user experience that meets their needs and will keep them coming back to use it. This isn’t just about implementing features that your power users say they want, but understanding how all types of users will interact with this new feature or version of your core application. If you have different types of power users then you should prioritize based on what’s best for each group (in addition to your other testing). By understanding who will use the application, you’ll be able to prioritize your product roadmap and feature set to meet their needs and develop a more successful product.
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2- What Do My Users Want?
Once you’ve prioritized who your users are, then it’s time to ask them what they want. If you haven’t done so already, getting feedback from all of your different types of power users is essential to creating an awesome user experience and features that people actually need (as opposed to just guessing). There are several ways of doing this: find out what similar companies in the space have done by visiting the App Store or Google Play for inspiration; conduct quality research with surveys or focus groups; and (my favorite), always give people sneak peeks of what you’re working on so they feel included and excited about the product.
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3- How Do My Users Want To Use It?
Next, figure out how your different types of power users actually interact with the product day-to-day – this is key for optimizing your user experience and creating a more precise set of features (and eliminating superfluous ones). Although I love brainstorming and throwing ideas in a hat until we get something good, I like to start by getting an understanding of how people currently behave in their jobs with our software. You can also ask questions like: What’s the most frustrating thing that happens when using [this feature]? Is there anything useful that [feature] could add?
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4- Prioritize Features & Eliminate Superfluous Ones
Now that you know how different types of power users are interacting with the product, prioritize what’s most useful. This might be a nice long list, but go through it and ask yourself what would actually be useful to your target audience. Do they really need an improved training feature? Or could we just push existing resources and tutorials more?
5- Implement & Iterate On New Features: Don’t Forget Testing!
Ok, so now you’ve got a prioritized list of new or modified features ready for implementation – congrats! The next thing I like to do is brainstorm potential test opportunities – this lets us find our “A-ha!” moment as quickly as possible without pouring months into building something we can’t test until we know what we’re supposed to be testing.
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For example, if you’re adding a new feature that will likely be used across many different product interfaces – perhaps an improved search experience – testers could focus on looking for problems searching for specific items, or items already in their cart. For this particular scenario, you could also potentially look at the Cart & Checkout process including abandoned carts and other pain points here. Functional areas like Homepage Navigation/Usability might also be good areas to explore.
Once you’ve chosen a few key areas, brainstorm ways testers might use the new features in those scenarios:
How Might Someone Who Is Already Logged In Use It? What Information Would They Have Available? What Actions Could They Perform?
How might someone who isn’t logged in using it? What steps would they have to take, or information would they need to provide, before being able to access the new feature.
Describe what you envision each role doing with the new features. Not only does this help ensure that the feature is designed for both roles, but it also gives your developers details so there are fewer questions about how different scenarios work. Here’s an example:
Logged in users will be able to view their account history and previous orders by clicking on “my account”. – They will then be able to see items included in those orders and any discounts applied, as well as provide comments about their experience with that particular item/vendor. Logged in users will have the option to report items offensive or deemed dangerous, which would then be sent to a review board for further investigation.
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The design makes it clear how a logged-in user has the ability to view their purchase history and leave comments about different items. A developer isn’t going to need to question whether this is an authenticated feature or not because it’s clearly outlined in the design!
Designing your application with your developers in mind doesn’t mean designing everything exactly as they tell you they want it – that would make things incredibly boring. Instead, think of them as another stakeholder in your app, with their own requests and opinions on what they think is best for end-users.
