Building the Product Roadmap

I recently talked about creating an effective product roadmap in this Antwak series. 

In one of the earlier posts, I talked about how to make a data-driven product roadmap. Deriving your goals in themes like Acquisition, Conversion, Money/Revenue, Engagement makes things a lot easy for keeping the roadmap data driven. Also, in the previous post, I talked about various brackets in which the features of a software product can be categorized. 

I felt the list of brackets can also help in getting ideas for a comprehensive list of tasks for the roadmap. 

Here's the list of those brackets again with some more details and examples. I'd soon add a link to the template for a product roadmap. (The list is not in any particular order.)

Feature Brackets for a Product Roadmap 

1. Parity Feature

A feature that the competition (if any) already has. The kind of features that you need, to be 'at Par' with them. The kind of features that your prospects will compare and ask questions about when you try to close the sale, especially for SaaS products. In case of consumer products, you wouldn't have loyal users mostly. You can be in good books of consumers as long as you keep providing at least what your competition is providing.  
E.g. Integration with Slack (for a Reporting Software), Price comparison (for e-commerce), Video call (for chatting app), Panic button (in a ride-hailing app) etc.  

2. Expected feature 

A feature that's naturally expected from your product. It's generally the USP, but also, includes conversion and revenue related features. In 2012, importing contact book was a disruptive feature by WhatsApp, as of 2017 importing the contact book is an expected feature for a chat application. 
E.g. Signup/Login, Home Page, Subscribe (for content-based product), Purchase module (for SaaS/E-Commerce)

3. Advanced feature 

A feature that only a power user would love. Usually, a first time user may not get it, or care about it. For someone new to youtube, it doesn't hurt that you can't filter a certain type of videos. But, as a parent and longtime consumer of Kid Video, I strongly feel the need for it. Youtube hasn't heard me yet. [Update: Youtube does have a Youtube kids app, however, a filter would really help so much more]
E.g. Customisation options like Themes, Font Settings, Filters 

4. By-products 

What perhaps 3rd parties are providing on top of your solution. It may also be an unexpected use of your product. Check my last post for more details. 
E.g. Facebook for Business, Google Tez, Youtube-kids (special app for kids) 

5. Unexpected feature 

Unsolicited, clever add-on features that can delight users in certain situations. 
E.g. Panic button in Ola (a cab hailing app), Forgot attachment notification on Gmail. 

6. Repayment feature 

Most of the time you are hacking stuff to get it out of the door. You should plan it such, that all the stuff that you kept for "later", don't get too late. Reducing technical debt, legal debt, doing compliance related stuff. 
E.g. Technical Architecture, Optimising performance, Documentation, creating really useful terms and conditions, Disclaimers, EULA, Security certifications, Government licenses and approvals etc. 

7. Engagement feature 

A cab-hailing app also allows you to store frequently visited places as favorites. An e-commerce website also allows creating a wishlist. These are not the primary use case, nor do they awe the users. They just give a sense of completeness to the product. Engagement is about providing a complete ecosystem for the user to feel connected with the product. Obviously, these features have the potential to hold the users longer, bring them back often. 
E.g. "You may also like", Favorites, Cashback, Leaderboards, Newsletter Subscription 

8. Viral feature 

Will get you more users. More often they are targeted for providing exceptional growth for a limited time. 
E.g. Referral Schemes, Incentive to Add your contact Book etc.   

9. Security feature 

Keeps your product, your users and/or your data safe. Some basic security is always appreciated by the users. Nothing is hack proof but you can ensure that it's not easy for a school kid to put you to shame - at least in the early days.  
E.g. OTP verification, Https, Pattern lock on your phone, Captcha, Re-Login 

10. Instrumentation feature 

Features that help you measure and monitor the growth/health of the product. If you are not measuring you are not improving. 
E.g. Integration with basic Analytics, integration with advanced analytics, integration with   

To understand which feature bucket is more important at which stage (early, growth, maturity etc.) of your product you can have a look at this previous post. This should provide a good reference to make sure your feature list and roadmap is both comprehensive and stresses on the right areas at the right time. 

Thoughts? I'd love to know your thoughts and comments. Please take a moment to write them.  




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