Writing great product one pagers

Have you ever started a new project, needed to onboard and get up to speed on project details, and was sent 5–10 lengthy documents to read? I have and it wasn’t a great way to learn about the product and overall project because of how time consuming and cumbersome it was to navigate those documents. You should be able to tell a product’s story in 1–2 pages, and have it be accessible for everyone to read and understand within a few minutes. This means you must explain details in a concise manner, incorporate a level of product thinking and encourage collaboration throughout the process of creating successful one pagers. So, what makes successful product one pagers?

What does winning look like?

Starting off by clearly communicating what winning looks like provides clarity into what product success looks like. It shows that the team has considered what will make the product successful before explaining how to get there (don’t worry, I’ll get to the section about how to win soon). Winning is often in the form of metrics, something like ‘X million monthly creators’ or ‘X billion monthly users sharing content weekly’.

Aside from metrics, winning can also be in a more adjective driven form. For example: ‘Make the simplest and most inclusive platform to connect users with topics that matter to them most’. In this case, winning comes in the form of simplification, inclusivity and diversification.

Scratch pad of ideas

Once I’ve defined what winning looks like, I’ll open up the world of possibilities by jotting down any and all ideas that come to mind. Maybe this is something like, “How much does real time content matter”? Or maybe, “How much focus do we want on peer to peer connection vs. peer to content connection?” These ideas can be rough, they don’t have to be fully thought out, but formulating ideas here help with tremendously with early product alignment and goals.

What’s the focus?

Once you’ve figured out what winning looks like and have some general ideas written, you’ll want to drive attention towards where you’ll be settled with the product, and the details that will lead it to victory. This can include:

• What geographic region(s) are you focusing on?
• What media/devices will be primary vs. secondary?
• Who is your target audience?
• What type of media does the product require?
• How accessible is the product and what are the tradeoffs?
• What is the product’s identity?
• What is our timeline and overall scope?

What are the product’s superpowers?

Chances are theres competitors out there, and many are likely doing the same thing as your product. It’s challenging to create that shiny new thing that everyone wants and loves, but it’s important to understand and identify your product’s superpowers. This allows you to differentiate yourself from competition and can be how you market your product to the world. This can include:

• “Making memories”: Share memories and make connections anywhere
• “The next big hit”: A product that’s desirable, fresh and wanted
• “Real-time delivery”: No lag and up to date media delivery globally

How do we win?

I promised you earlier I’d get to this section, and now the time is finally here! Up until this point, you’ve set the product up for great success already by laying much of the foundation and context, but what everyone who reads these one pagers wants to know is how we’ll win? These can be short bullet points, similar to your scratch pad of ideas. Although this time, you’ll want to ensure these will get you to what winning looks like. Ideas here might include:

• Help people find what matters to them most as quickly as possible
• Be the most trusted and used platform worldwide through enhanced in-product privacy and safety
• Put creators in the drivers seat by allowing community building

Each of these can have sub-bullets with the ways you’ll achieve them. For example, you can help people find what matters most to them as quickly as possible by: asking what they want to see in onboarding, connect with other social accounts, or maybe through building an inclusive social network.

Measuring success

The last part of a product one pager is outlining how success will be measured. This doesn’t necessarily have to be fully metrics driven, but collected data is a telling sign of how a product is doing. This might mean you want to understand how long users are engaging with your product (session length), or maybe gather insights on how many creators there are and what kind of content they’re both producing and consuming? You can even look into number of uninstalls or deactivated members as a signal of where your product might need improving.