Product Roadmap

Strategic clarity, communication, and prioritisation of product features.

We talk a lot about product roadmaps

If we work together, you will hear us discuss product roadmaps.

They are a critical, strategic, and evolving deliverable that help align, define priorities, and agree on product and channel deliverables.

However, the benefit of the product roadmap goes further.

Supported by data and a sensible process, product and marketing teams can proactively engage with their broader business, articulating prioritisation, and reducing reactionary business decisions.

Better still, the product roadmap is a visual representation, meaning there are fewer barriers to engagement by the broader business.

The benefits of a product roadmap

In outlining the benefits of a product roadmap, we could also outline the disadvantages of product development without a roadmap:

Inefficient resource management, poor decision-making, reactionary development, unaligned priorities, potentially grinding to a halt.

Traditional website development by traditional digital agencies has often been done without the benefits of the product roadmap: poor development outcomes, poor website outcomes, and a failure of the website or product to progress and improve methodically and sensibly.

As a product agency steeped in product management, we can’t operate without product roadmaps and here is why you shouldn’t either:

Alignment and clarity

The product roadmap aligns all teams and stakeholders on the goals and vision for your digital product and channels. By having a clear roadmap, everyone involved can understand how their work and effort contribute to the more significant product goals.

Focus is improved, collaboration is improved, and misunderstandings are mitigated.

Prioritised and resource allocation become clear.

A product roadmap prioritises features, enhancements, initiatives, and experiments based on their strategic value. Because the product roadmap is visual, dependencies can also be visualised, allowing the business to allocate resources effectively and make informed decisions about what to build and when.

Customer-centricity is not an afterthought.

The product roadmap helps direct focus on customer needs, desires and the value exchange between the business and its customers. This could include initiatives to gather customer needs and preferences and then to ensure these are included on the initiatives in the product roadmap, ultimately leading to a better product.

The Product Agency’s approach to building Product Roadmaps

Each client and their needs are different.

Larger organisations may need multiple product roadmaps: one for product development, one for executives showing the progression of multiple digital products, and one for sales.

Some businesses are building out a new digital product, while others may be well down the track, needing vision and alignment through the implementation of a product roadmap.

For smaller businesses, the product roadmap can often serve as a broader business roadmap, incorporating other initiatives such as sales, marketing, and technology.

Therefore, there is no one answer, though the goal is always the same.

To explain some of the approaches we take with our clients to help them develop and evolve their product roadmap, here are some common situations we encounter.

1. We want to build a new digital product and need help aligning around a product roadmap

Starting with a fresh slate can often be great, though it doesn’t mitigate the need to ladder to the product roadmap by undertaking or analysing the supporting groundwork:

• Market trajectories
• Customer insights
• Business goals
• Effort constraints

In turn, this helps form the MVP for the new digital product and from there, features can be prioritised on the roadmap.

Businesses must balance typical business requirements, be lean, and get to market as quickly as possible. We can help find that balance by focusing on meeting both.

2. We have an existing digital product and need help aligning around a product roadmap

This is a common scenario and can call for a clean slate.

In this scenario, businesses have usually encountered the challenges and roadblocks that come from not having a product roadmap and, without prioritisation and alignment, cannot hit the cadence of product development they need.

Often, the issue can run deeper, particularly within more complex businesses where product development is not a core function or one the broader business is across or aligned with.

In this situation, the laddering to the product roadmap includes working and aligning stakeholders from the point where alignment does not exist. Finding this point is where we can help.

3. We have a product roadmap, though we keep being diverted off-course

In many businesses, this is a common complaint.

Despite internal product and development teams going to great lengths to build and articulate their product roadmap, their efforts are subverted by unaligned business needs and requests.

In turn, the time invested in the product roadmap and prioritisation is lost, and the product’s development is often focused away from where it would optimally be.

This leads, of course, to sub-optimal product performance.

Such a situation can be complex, especially where commercial imperatives can override without consultation or an understanding or appreciation of product priorities.

New processes and more consistent alignment between the business and internal product teams can often help businesses and internal product teams find an acceptable balance.  

Our experience in and working for businesses with this challenge means we can help guide the process and demonstrate better product outcomes.

External validation is sometimes a good catalyst for this to start and to get buy-in.

Why do we believe our approach works and can make a difference?

As we often say, product is about lateral thinking.

Combined with extensive experience in complex businesses, and to reach an optimal end-state, we work with internal teams to understand their complexities, and especially the organisational realities they face.

We can help articulate and demonstrate the benefit of alignment, especially around product roadmaps. We can use creativity and proven models and methodologies to help businesses become more product-focused.

Do you want to discuss your product roadmap?

As we said, external validation is often a great way to start the conversation and seek improvement.

We would love to hear your challenges and to help you work through them.