PM Skills for Digital Products

There is no single person in the digital field that has not listened to the term (Digital)Product accompanied with the role of a Product Manager(PM). Even if you are not in the digital domain, you realize what a product is because this term has referred to anything produced for hundreds of years.

Product: A tangible or intangible good or service. The result of a process with the purpose to be delivered to an end user.

A product is any sellable item in exchange for money or barter. The word product originates from the verb produce, from the Latin prōdūcere which means: to lead or bring forth.

Products can be goods, services, or ideas, such as intellectual property.
When you go to IKEA, your local grocery store or even for your monthly massage your end goal is to obtain their product.

In marketing, you may hear the definition of a product as any system made available for client use; anything that can be offered to the market to fulfill the client needs. You can view any service as a kind of product.

Digital Product: Any product that comes in a digital form and typically can be used through the Internet.

A digital product is any product you can trade virtually. It arrives in digital form (at least initially), and typically you can download it from the Internet. Famous digital product firms are Google, Netflix, Spotify, etc.

Google disrupts the analog needs of physical maps, dictionaries, newspapers, and many others. Netflix is a digital video-club, and Spotify is your old-school cd storage in a digital form.

Fact #1: Apple is not a fully digital production company. Apple’s highest revenue grows from analog products like the iPhone and Macbook’s.

Fact #2: You can convert digital into physical products, i.e., download this post and print it on your computer.

Product Manager: A “Brand Man” that takes full responsibility for general brand development. — Neil McElroy, 1931

The primitive form of Product management called Brand management, a term invented by an advertising manager named Neil McElroy, who in 1931 wrote the famous memo to the executive team at Procter & Gamble suggesting the idea of a “brand man” — an employee who would be responsible for a product, rather than a business function. Back then Camay soap was a minor brand to the company’s leading Ivory soap brand. Camay sales were not fine, and McElroy concluded that a dedicated “brand man” (with supporting team) was needed to guarantee that sales of the brand were being maximized.

The role had the following responsibilities which you can recognize many similarities to the modern state of digital product management:

1. Understand the regions and quantities of product being shipped.
2. For regions where sales are excellent or growing, learn why and try to apply those principles to other similar areas.
3. Where sales are light, examine the state to understand the difficulties. Devise a plan to address the challenges and cooperate with internal parties to ensure the project is healthy.
4. Take care for all messaging and promotional copy of the brands
5. Oversee advertising and marketing expenses for the brands
6. Analyze new things, particularly with the packaging of the brands
7. Work with local sales managers to understand their aspect of what is and isn’t working in their region

Digital Product Manager: A person responsible for orchestrating various activities associated with ensuring that a digital product meets users needs

As many of you may think a Digital Product Manager is a Product manager downloadable via the internet. But, NO! (LOL)
As times goes by and products become more user-centric, organizations start to see the wisdom in implementing some of the same principles of product management to their products.

Digital Product managers speak to users to help figure out what to develop, define requirements and create functional specifications. They work closely with the development team in every part of the software development process. They hear and note new ideas, support time balance when technical challenges occur — and push back to C-level when technical refactors needed — product managers involved in the software before the first code is written, till after it goes live.

Product managers are often thought of as resting at the intersection of business, design, and technology.

Throughout all stages of the product development process, the Product manager represents the needs of end-users, evaluates market trends and competition, and relates this information to plan feature development. For example, a Product manager may pick a feature because users are asking for it, or because this element is needed for product competitiveness.

To promote this decision-making method, the Product manager may set out a vision for the product or a universal framework for making product decisions. The product manager also ensures an environment of cohesiveness and focused collaboration among team members, all in the pursuit of pushing the product forward.

The position of the product in a typical organizational structure.

The above image represents a typical structure of digital organization teams. Each part has a vital role in the product lifecycle and also the vitality of the company. Almost all PMs right now have studies on — at-least-one — of the above fields.

1. Business Development: Every company needs a plan, someone to lead the primary strategy, the one that takes the idea and communicates it into the organization in order everyone understands how this project can be viable. Usually, the C-Level lies into this part of the structure, and for many analog organizations, this is the core team.
2. Marketing: The team that takes care of product publicity keeps your brand character and knows your audience better than anyone. Don’t forget that product manager term started as “Brand man” through a marketing team that evolved this role. Marketing team must ensure users benefit from the product first because this is the best foundation for acquisition, retention, and loyalty, and not putting the company’s profit first.
3. Technology: No many words needed to describe this team; there is no company developing a digital product without a tech team. All the automation and digital “magic” comes from this team. Product managers have a close relationship with the tech team; that’s why product management is often aligned with tech teams.
4. Design: Many think that design teams are overrated, but I can assure that good design it’s more than meets the eye. User Interface(UI) design evolved from traditional graphic design through the years, and now the design process includes more technical parameters than ever. Besides, User Experience(UX) design with deep roots in cognitive science provides an extra dimension to the design systems. A PM must spend a big part of his day with the design team.

The above order shows the significance of the teams for the viability of a company but in reverse order, reveals the importance of the product parts that attract a user nowadays. It’s a rule of thumb, and I am not saying that is right but is common for users to get excited from the right looks(aka design) and automation(aka technology) of a product. On the other hand, they usually get disturbed from the constant digital ads(aka marketing) that flow around the web, making them feel like that all companies see them as profit(aka Business).

Direct connection sub-parts of an organization with the Product team.

After speaking for the top level team structure is time to understand how these teams collaborate with Product.

• Business Intelligence (BI): My favorite team has the most critical position in product development. BI is the key master of all the data gathered from product usage. They can analyze and provide useful reports that back any decision from business to operational and strategic. A PM must know what to ask and of course, collaborate with the BI team to develop a solid plan of data gathering.
• Customer Relationship Marketing (CRM): CRM focuses on what the user takes out of the interaction with the product, and how to improve the “value” that users gain (service, automation, benefit), combining earnings in revenue from cross/up/frequency selling with savings in cost from better customer service and communications. This method involves product changes to help users.
• Growth: Growth team lies in the interconnection of tech and marketing. Usually, growth marketeers are hybrid developers with an eye on marketing. They understand how code manipulation improves google ranking(SEO), and getting their hands dirty can run A/B Tests for better product improvements.
• Branding: Much more than the logo and the looks, your product’s character and tone of voice come through branding. The whole look and feel can be boosted via a good brand guide, and this field overlaps marketing with product design.
• User Experience (UX): User experience is the essence of product design. Developers with in-depth knowledge of Human-Computer interactions can easily collaborate with Product designers that have done tons of user research and provide a perfect roadmap for product improvements.
• Quality Assurance (QA): QA includes two ways of testing, automated and manual. Automated testing is added during a code is written and provides the first check of product quality. Manual testing, on the other hand, is usually a dirty job that needs time and dedication to flourish. Manual testers must be respected as much as your super users; they work hard to assure that the next product version will not surprise(in a wrong way) the market!

The virtues of any manager.

For the epilogue of this article, I kept the most crucial part of product management, and this lies under Manager part. Any manager regardless of prefix (product, sales, marketing, human resources, etc.) must own and practice daily the following to give impetus to their craft. Even a master of the previous techniques must have soft skills to reach the top outcome of his team.

Fortunately, there are no rockstars in digital product development and teamwork is the only thing that delivers.

• Organize: The most crucial part is organizing your team and product. From daily tasks to documentation and priorities. The team must never feel that something is missing and the work is losing its rhythm. You must organize every aspect of work that needs to be done in a way to be ready to be consumed by your team. You are the coach, and you have a prepared plan for every match, maximizing your players’ performance.
• Cooperate: Cooperation throughout the company is the secret to be ready for every issue arises. You must be in sync with all parts of the organization and understand what teams prepare that may need product changes or time from your side. Break the silos, increase productivity and always be on par with all areas.
• Inspire: Always be crystal clear to your team, about your concerns, the things that will come and your product vision. They are the only people that can help your product dreams come true, and they deserve your respect and honesty. The worst thing that can happen within your team is a culture of apathy and lonely cowboys. Embrace human errors and share the learnings.
• Support: Support can be summed up in the constant availability to your team at any given time. But it’s more than the team and availability. We create products for humans by humans and technology is just the medium of this trip. You must support our colleagues, team members, even our users in any way possible. Develop your team members skills and therefore develop a better product for the market.

The above post is a summary of the presentation I gave for Product School in Athens, Greece on April 2nd, 2019.

Thank you and Godspeed.

Building A Web Or Mobile App?

Crowdbotics is the fastest way to build, launch and scale an application.

Developer? Try out the Crowdbotics App Builder to quickly scaffold and deploy apps with a variety of popular frameworks.

Busy or non-technical? Join hundreds of happy teams building software with Crowdbotics PMs and expert developers. Scope timeline and cost with Crowdbotics Managed App Development for free.