Roadmap to Success: How to launch a successful software product

Photo by Austin Distel on Unsplash

Launching a product can be extremely exciting, especially if you’ve been working on it behind the scenes for some time and finally get to release it to your target audience. At the same time, it can also feel overwhelming and daunting if you have never done it before. If you’re looking to create and launch your first software product, or if you’re hoping to launch your next one successfully, it’s helpful to have a roadmap in front of you.

This roadmap can be your guide as you develop and launch your product; as you progress down each step, you will learn more about your target market and gain further insight into the most important features. This guide will show you how to create an effective launch plan that includes all the steps required to ensure success in both your product and your business, whether this is your first or fiftieth product launch.

What is a Software Product?

A software product is a program or piece of code that can be used to solve a problem. For example, Google Docs is a software product that allows people to create and share documents online. The programs are available on multiple devices, like laptops and smartphones.

A software product should not just work in theory; it should also work in the real world. Users want the programs to be user-friendly so they can use them with ease. To develop a successful software product, it’s important to have an innovative idea before creating the product so you know exactly what you want your program or piece of code to do. From there, you can create sketches for your design process for any user interface elements you will need for your final program/code. Have a look at image for complete software development life cycle:

Benefits of having your own software product

Aside from the financial benefits, having your own software product allows you to build an online presence that is completely your own. As long as you create something people want, the sky’s the limit for success. Here are 10 business benefits of having a software product:

1) Control- Your product will be fully under your control and no one else’s. You’ll be able to update it without waiting on approval from anyone else.

2) Low cost — A lot of the development costs are done upfront so you’ll only need some minor expenses later on when it comes time to update or change anything about it

3) Limited liability- Once a customer buys it, they’re using their own responsibility not yours.

4) Passive income- If you know how to create a successful software product, you can make money passively off of its sales.

5) You can sell it anywhere- One major benefit is that once you have a program developed and packaged up for sale, it can be sold anywhere in the world because there are customers everywhere.

6) An increase in productivity- Your work life balance will improve because instead of working all day long at your regular job and then going home to work more hours on the computer or take care of children, you’ll only have to focus on working towards your goal when it’s convenient for you.

7) You don’t need permission from anyone else to start making money with your product!

8) Customization- Being in charge means you can customize your product any way you like.

9) Valuable asset- Your new found creation has the potential to be a valuable asset over time if it’s done right.

10) Long term investment- The ultimate benefit of having your own software product is knowing that it’ll last and grow over time into something big!

Tips to launch a successful software product:

Research your market and competition

Before you start your first steps, it’s important to research the market and competition. Who are the major players? What is their pricing? What features do they offer? What is the customer sentiment around them? All this information will help you better identify your target audience and meet their needs.

When researching competitors, take note of what sets each apart from one another and what sets them apart from you. If you want to differentiate yourself from the rest of the pack, now is the time to start brainstorming about how that can happen.

Reacquaint your team with your user and buyer personas.

A critical step in developing your roadmap is getting your team on the same page. Reacquaint your team with your user and buyer personas. If you have created personas before, go over them with your team members.

Make sure everyone knows who your user and buyer personas are and what their goals are for using the product. If you haven’t created personas, this would be a good time to do so. Once you have done that, go over them with your team members and make sure everyone understands who they are.

User personas include the primary users of your product as well as people who use it occasionally; buyer personas are people involved in purchasing decisions about products like yours.

Remind yourselves about the “why” behind your product.

It’s important to remind yourself about the why behind your product. Why do you want it? What does the world need? Who is your ideal customer? These questions will help you know what direction your product should take.

You’ll also be able to know who your competitors are and what they’re doing right (or wrong). It’s important not to feel discouraged if you don’t have all of these answers, because as long as you have a solid idea of the problem that needs solving and why it needs solving, then there are plenty of ways to approach finding solutions.

Consider working with a mentor or advisor who can help guide the process and keep you on track.

Prepare yourself for growth and more users

If you’re just getting started and you know that your app is going to be popular, it’s important to take steps now before the release. These tips will help prepare yourself for growth and more users.

• Start marketing early. Create a website with an email list, post on social media sites, and use Google Adwords or Facebook Ads.
• Prepare yourself for success by setting up analytics beforehand so that you can track your key metrics like session duration and conversion rate.
• Know the best time of day for your target audience so that you can schedule the release for when people are most likely using it. Make sure to have enough server space if you anticipate a lot of traffic on release day and make sure all pages load quickly without any crashes.
• Consider hosting your app in the cloud rather than relying on physical hardware because it allows scaling as needed. You should also create an FAQ page with instructions on how to get started using the application.
• Always test new features out in beta first. Let beta testers give feedback before making changes to all users’ experiences — this way you’ll avoid potential backlash and save time!
• When planning upgrades, consider whether there are any back-end improvements or optimizations that could be made while still maintaining compatibility with old data formats

Make sure you have the right tool to build your roadmap.

Building your roadmap is easy with the right tool. Here’s what you need to know about making sure you have the right tool for the job.

• Research your target market — Determine your target audience and their needs.
• Choose the best time to launch — Pick an optimal time for launching your product, like when you’re releasing new features or when there is a lack of competing products on the market.
• Start with two versions of your roadmap — Identify two versions of your roadmap that are relevant to where you want to go in the future. Version one should be short-term while version two should be long-term (1–3 years). Choose which set of goals will help you achieve success quicker.
• Build prototypes — Prototype early and often throughout the process to make sure that your ideas will work before developing them into full-fledged projects. Find out which prototyping tools work best for each phase by searching online for articles and blog posts about prototyping.
• Involve stakeholders — Get input from others who are involved in this project or initiative at all phases of the process, so that everyone has ownership over it. To do this successfully, consider using tools like management dashboards, project management tools, surveys, etc., so everyone knows how far along the process is at any given time.

Keep your roadmap’s contents brief, high-level, and jargon-free.

The following is a roadmap for successfully launching your software product. It’s brief, high-level, and jargon-free. To create a more complete roadmap that’s filled with content that makes sense to the reader, consult our white paper on how to create an effective roadmap here. It outlines all of the details in this post and provides a detailed example at the end of how it all comes together.

Create a timeline for your product launch plan.

This timeline is a general guideline for the launch of a product. The order in which you tackle each task may vary, but this is a good way to get your ideas straight.

• One month before launch — Finalize business plan and figure out how you’re going to get your product out into the world.
• Two weeks before launch — Update website with new information about the product. Create an FAQ page with common questions about your product and its features.
• One week before launch — Send a press release about your product’s release date. Announce it on social media channels like Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Use roadmap swimlanes to divide responsibilities.

The roadmap should be divided into swimlanes, which is the set of lanes that you will use to break up the overall project. These lanes are usually used for specific areas or stages in a project. It’s common to see technology-based projects organized into five swimlanes for pre-production, production, beta, release and post-release. This is meant to help keep the focus on each stage of the product life cycle.

For example, one lane would have goals for what needs to happen during the pre-production phase such as design, testing and team building; while another lane would have goals related to designing marketing campaigns and brand identity.

A lot of companies also use swimlanes in their roadmaps to account for cross-functional tasks like HR initiatives and marketing activities as well. Swimlane diagrams can also represent an organization’s hierarchy through columns that represent organizational structures.

Build in a review process and timeframe for each initiative.

The process of building a roadmap is quite similar to creating a business plan. The key difference is that the roadmap process should take less time and should emphasize simplicity and transparency.

Roadmapping an initiative also requires more rigor, as the team needs consensus around what each action is trying to accomplish. It’s also important for a good roadmap process to have ownership attached and assigned for each initiative.

It’s necessary for anyone who will be responsible for execution on each specific area of the product development lifecycle.

Include the product metrics you’ll be monitoring post-launch.

Post-launch, you’ll need to monitor the following metrics and adjust your product accordingly.

The number of new users. This is an indicator for how well your product is doing. If you’re not seeing any growth in the first three months post-launch, it might be time to revamp the product or start marketing it differently.

The number of returning users. Again, this shows how useful your product is and whether or not people are getting what they want out of it. If people stop coming back, you’ll have to revisit the features in order to make them more appealing or easier to use. User engagement/usage time.

Incorporate feedback methods into your product launch plan

It’s important to find ways for your customers and users to give feedback on your product. Even if you know what you’re doing, it’s always good practice to solicit feedback from customers and users. You should Incorporate feedback methods into your product launch plan as early as possible.

Ask questions such as:

How often do you use the product?

What features would you like us to implement next?

Letting people test the product before the launch date will not only help them understand how it works, but they’ll also be able to provide valuable feedback that can be used during development.

Regularly review your product launch plan

Product launch plans should be reviewed regularly. You should review your product launch plan monthly, even though you may not want to work on it every day.

• Maintain an updated list of target customers and their contact information
• Review your product’s pricing structure and update as needed
• Plan out your marketing campaign in detail, mapping out what you’ll do at every stage
• What will you do if the product doesn’t perform up to expectations?

The best way to prepare for this is by writing a detailed plan with contingencies. The more thorough your plan, the less likely you’ll have to scramble in order to save face or recoup any losses from a botched launch *Use that roadmap so that you’re always one step ahead of any curveballs

Conclusion

I hope that this roadmap has helped you create your own successful product. Hiring a software development company in the UK is crucial to the success of your product. A skilled software developer or development team will help you build an intuitive, easy-to-use interface that will keep your customers coming back for more. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us!