product definition
You understand your product, but do you understand your users?
You probably have a very clear idea about what your product is (or will be) and how people will use it. But have you really talked to potential paying customers?
The first people to start using your new product (the "early adopters") can be hugely helpful in defining what the product does, how it will be used in practice and most importantly how a user will value it.
We can help you hear the voices of your early adopters and work out what the implications should be for you. Once your product is established you will have to listen to a wider group of customers and we can help you spot when that is the case as well.
By Chris | November 25, 2009
How often is your use of a product frustrated by some little detail?
Last night I was sorting through the programs recorded on my Humax PVR. After you’ve negotiated an initial menu screen (surely getting a list of what you’ve recorded is such a common task that it deserves a button?), it initially displays the list in reverse chronological order – so the latest programs are at the top of the list. You have to press the blue button twice to change the sort order to chronological (oldest first) and then alphabetical so that all the programs from the same series are displayed together. But guess what? When it sorts alphabetically, if the names are identical, then the order of those programs appears to be random. So, if you are catching up on the latest “Garrow’s Law” (as we were), would you want to watch them in a random order? No! Whoever designed the interface never tried to use it for one of the most common user tasks, did they?
It is not just me being a grumpy product guy. Ordinary users pick these things up too. Here are a couple snatched from AVForums:
“the Humax UI was designed by people who don’t watch TV and deliberately avoided the conventions we all learned with VCRs. It’s a jarring experience” – Paul Shirley
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By Chris | October 30, 2009
How companies turn their back on gold plated commercial opportunities
We were relaxing after a dinner in a busy restaurant on the waterfront in Stockholm. We had been with the product designers all day, thrashing through the issues of the physical design of our new product. It was tough and we’d filled wipe boards, notebooks, cut stuff out and mocked up prototypes. We’d walked through user scenarios and talked about different personas. We’d discussed materials and components and littered the tables with samples of them. We’d talked ergonomics, about comfort, about how your hand met the product and what it would be like to use the product for hours on end.
The good Swedish food and beer were helping me relax, so the conversation finally moved away from the work of the day to our families and interests.
I asked one of the designers, a particular whizz at AutoCAD, what he did outside work.
“I design sex toys” he said with a completely straight face.
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By Chris | August 15, 2009
No product specification survives first contact with the user
We’ve all seen those product specifications that run to dozens or even hundreds of pages with every little detail described. Why do we do it?
Innovative products change their markets. We have to accept that this is the case or there would never have been markets for Personal Computers, Digital Cameras, Television, electricity, the wheel. The market does not exist when the product is first introduced and then goes through an often rapid development as consumers adapt to the new possibilities of the product type. Can we foresee how all of that will pan out before we introduce the first product of its type? Of course not.
As Helmuth von Moltke the Elder apparently said “No battle plan survives contact with the enemy” and I would extend that for new product development to say that no product specification survives contact with the user.
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Why uncertainty and indecision are natural in the new product development process
Customer stories that get your team into the mind of the customer
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