A product idea is something that you want to explore further --- you have some information but not all of it. This template provides questions to help get Product Managers focused and help them dive into the idea. It serves as a guide as PMs decide whether or not to pursue the opportunity and draft a Product Opportunity for their team.
The purpose of filling out this template is to set up a plan for further exploration. The questions are designed to help determine where to investigate further, and to encourage discussion with the team. This template is intentionally lightweight, can be used to quickly give ideas structure, and record ideas so they don't get lost. Product idea docs can be closed/archived and re-opened/unarchived later. They are not to be prioritized, rather product idea docs serve as a 'bulletin board' for ideas that come from other product opportunities, customer conversations, market research, etc.
Product idea: This is where you write down the name of your idea. Don't think too hard about it; you'll re-name it later. Also, don't give it a code name because it's not a project yet.
In this section, write down your idea's story. Think of it from the customer's perspective. What are they trying to do? Where are they getting frustrated? What other tools might they be using?
Some guidance for telling the story of your idea (you can delete this part later).
- Talk about who this is for, who's your customer (maybe even identify who your first customer would be)
- Don't try to solve a problem, this will take time and will stifle your team's imagination
- Introduce a hypothesis describing how this idea is a solution that benefits whatever objective you're trying to hit (company OKRs, team goals, etc.)
Who would benefit from this idea?
Which customer persona/segment would use this feature?
What's the user problem that you think you can solve with this idea?
Sometimes it's helpful to provide the evidence you have that lead you to discovering this problem.
What initial research have you done?
This can be competitive reviews or demos, customer conversations & quotes, user data, etc. The important thing is that this information will help kick off a discussion and provides good context for getting the team collaborating on the problem.
If you could hire a product to solve the problem, what would that product be?
You hire your coffee mug to hold your coffee and keep it warm while you drink it. The coffee mug is a really good idea!
Who at your organization might be interested in this idea?
This question helps bring people into the conversation, inviting them to participate if they want to, but doesn't commit them to any work. It's a way to suss out who you could collaborate with if you were to kick off a product opportunity exploration.
Where else in your org are people talking about similar ideas?
Think about a couple labels or categories that can sum up your idea, then do a quick search in github, google docs, slack, wherever your company stores and shares information and see where else people are talking about similar ideas. Link them in this section (maybe even organized by the categories/labels that helped with your search) to keep the conversation going and pull some threads together (everyone loves a little consolidation).
/cc @ mention others who you've been talking with about this idea