The Hiddens Skills of Product Development

Is B2B product development a skill or an art?


It's a little bit of both but in this short article I'm going to show you how to make it more skill than art. Here's a couple of things you need to perfect as you move your product from concept to launch.


First Things First - Develop a Project Plan

Here's a good place to start because the best product development project can become derailed quickly if you don't know how to properly plan. My motto is THINK, PLAN, DO. Follow this and you will never go wrong. Over the years I've personally witnessed companies that have jumped to DO bypassing the other two steps and have found themselves unable to react during the development and incubation stages.


If you are familiar with any of the popular project software, like Microsoft Project, feel free to use it. Don't be intimidated though if you are not familiar with any of these. You don't need sophisticated software to prepare a project plan. Remember, it's not the equipment, it's the player.


OK, so you know the devil is in the details so be as specific as possible. It's OK if you miss steps but every project plan should cover processes (steps), people, and time required. The more plans you write the better you will get at it; promise.


Prepare a Budget

I'm often asked, within what margin should the budget be. It may take a while to get a feel for this so be patient and pay attention to what it costs to build your products. Whether you have to use an outside company for development or are being cross charged from an internal department, know your products, the components, and make sure you stick to your plan. Remember my motto, Think, Plan, Do. I guarantee you will overrun your budget if you go straight to DO.

The next question is should you account for the people time. Some of my larger clients who have mature product development departments are capable of allocating full time resources so it is easy to account for the cost of their time. Otherwise, these are sunk costs and trying to account for time other than x% is not worth the effort.


Translating Needs into Requirements

I use a proprietary approach I developed that allows product development teams to quickly identify the stakeholders and map to their needs. Once you know the needs of your target base it's easy to figure out what features need to be built that the customer wants, will keep you within budget, and can be launched within your time frame. Remember, you don't have to build everything in the first phase. I'm a big believer in launching the basic requirements and phasing in new features in future releases that can be publicized. The key is getting the first set right. Too many companies release products that do to much and end up confusing the target market and can't be priced correctly. My Marketing Optimization Grids ensures this never happens.


The Battle for Customers' Minds (Value Prop)
I want to spend just a second talking about value proposition. Here's my definition. I want the customer to do something different than what they do today at a cost (lower, the same or more) that will provide some added utility versus their current product or process. So you see if you add in a lot of features it makes it hard for the customer to understand how this may fit into their current process. The customer may be open to new solutions but if you make the comparison too hard it inertia takes over. And, as I always say, "you can never underestimate the power of inertia".

I'd love to know your product development stories. Write me here or visit me at Stages of Innovation.

Rob Goldberg 2009

Does Technology Help Sell

Can companies impact sales productivity positively with targeted investments in both technology and tools to provide additional support for their sales team's ability to win.

How many of you agree with this? I say tread carefully because once you start down the path to sales force productivity tools you become a slave to them. I'm not against them I'm just cautious about where and how to deploy them. And I would caution readers to have a well defined process in place before undertaking any sales force technology initiative.

So where and how can you make use of these tools? I have two ways that I've started.

1) Contact management. One of the best advancements I've seen has been the success of enterprise contact management programs. SaaS providers such as Salesforce.com have really made it easy to maintain, track, and report on customers and pipelines. Their move into more mainstream CRM for the masses has allowed small and mid-sized businesses to have the same technology as larger companies. As a user I can tell you it takes work and dedication to set up, run, and maintain. The information out is only as good as the information in. I've personally lived through the frustration with bad data and the clean up isn't ever worth it.

2) Shared storage. I started using Box.net as a way to keep centralized files. I can allow employees and customers to only see certain folders. It has made filing sharing easy(ier). It is like an FTP site but easier to use. Again it takes a lot of work to make sure the files are always up-to-date and that outdated materials are removed.

There are many great companies that provide sales force tools and I would love to hear about their products and your personal implementation and success stories. Comment here or you can email me directly at rgoldberg@stagesofinnovation.com.

Rob Goldberg 2009

Sales Magic Wand

What if you could arm your sales executives with the right resources for each challenge posed by a customer/prospect or competitor? What impact do you think having such a powerful "magic wand" would make on you or your team's ability to win deals.

They already have a magic wand, in fact they have 2. its called their ears. If your sales people listened more they would be able to respond to "challenges" from prospects, customers and competitors.

We use a process we developed at Stages of Innovation (http://www.stagesofinnovation.com/) called the Marketing Optimization Grid. We use it for new products as well as helping to tweak existing ones and to sell against the competition.

It is a series of 4 grids that in Grid 1 work through the customer needs and which stakeholders either have the need, influence the sale, or is a decision maker. In Grid 2 you are looking at what features of your product or service you should be emphasizing so your customer can receive the benefit to satisfy their needs. Grid 3 takes you out of selling and into marketing and focuses on positioning by looking at how you should package the offer. And finally in Grid 4 you look at value proposition by looking at what they are giving up to use your product or service.

We start at Grid 1 for new products. At Grid 2 to tweak our existing products. And at Grid 4 and work backwards to look at competitive products. The process backwards decomposes the competitors offer and identifies the gaps in meeting the customer's needs. It becomes very easy to sell against the gaps.

It works but it requires your sales people to stop talking, ask questions and listen to the customer.

To find out more take a go to my web site at http://www.stagesofinnovation.com/

Rob Goldberg 2009