Product Current: Vol. 3
A collection of inspiration, articles, and trends in the world of digital products from the Innovatemap team.
Product videos
We came across a cool product called Plasso which provides a business platform for subscription businesses. This is great by itself, but what we love is this fantastic “How-To” that helps you make better product videos. Escape the quintessential jingly piano and ukulele music (coupled with stock animation) and make a video that highlights real value(s) of your product.
Product positioning
April Dunford provides a nice breakdown of product positioning. She dispels the myth that positioning and messaging are the same. Product positioning is more of an internal frame of reference that you will use to guide the product. Messaging flows naturally out of your agreed-upon positioning, but should be simple, relevant, and repeatable for your customers.
Product branding the city
Recently, IDEO undertook the monumental effort of designing an identity and brand system for the city of Boston. IDEO captured the well-known identity of Boston and reflected it in nearly every interface the city has with its citizens, from boston.gov to bus stop ads and letterheads.
Under Consideration has a great writeup of the new identity:
Product research
The long-awaited Cassette app was finally released, and user researchers everywhere rejoiced. The app helps you record and share interviews. While the product marketing focuses primarily on design, I can see this being useful for anyone conducting interviews.
Also worth noting is the site itself. It’s just one page with no unnecessary fluff, and the copy is concise. I don’t think the stock photos add much (why aren’t the images showing actual usage?), but they make up for it with a “Coming Soon” section — something more products need to be open about.
Product in the midwest
I recently pulled together a list of ten new tech products that came out of Indiana in 2016. They were all nominated for Mira Awards, which is an annual award event honoring tech companies in the state of Indiana. I wrote it up to bring some undue attention to digital products outside of the coasts.
Take a look!
Innovatemap is a product design and marketing agency based in Indianapolis, Indiana. We help startups and scale-ups bring marketable, valuable, and usable products to market.
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