The Manage Comics 2017 Road Map

2016 was a great first year for Manage Comics, we worked with our beta customers to figure out what worked and what didn’t. We talked to other shop owners to find out what they needed, and we worked with actual subscribers to find out what their pain points were.

After multiple surveys, many follow up emails, and several one-on-one conversations, we understand what we need to do to take Manage Comics to the next phase.

The best news is that as of January 1, 2017, Manage Comics is officially out of Beta. We have stomped all of the bugs, figured out all of the edge cases, and made an incredibly stable and robust application. Now we can focus on new things.

We took all of the requests from store owners, customers, and our own needs and assigned value and effort numbers to each task, and then sorted them by ROI to determine a road map for the future.

While we are still figuring out how we will fund all of the enhancements, we have a number of enhancements that we’re ready to launch by January 6th.

We will be launching the “Top 20 Most Subscribed Titles”, and “New Comics in the last 30 Days” features to help customers find comics easier.

For store owners we’ve adjusted the way that a store owner adds subscriptions to a customer’s list simplifying it, and we’ve added a “Cancelled” status for customers who no longer want to receive comics.

We’ve also fixed the last few bugs that we found which deal with how notes go onto payments from Stripe and PayPal.

Here’s the full list of what we’re doing

1. As a store owner I want to be able to send out newsletters V: 100, E: 1, ROI: 100
2. As a customer, I would like my orders to be in reverse chronological order V: 20, E: 1, ROI: 20
3. As a store owner I want to be able to easily add subscriptions to a customer V: 100, E: 3, ROI: 33
4. As a store owner, I need to be able to set the status of a customer to “Cancelled” V: 100, E: 3, ROI: 33
5. As a customer, I want a “NEW” page that shows all products added in the last 30 days V: 100, E: 3, ROI: 33
6. As a customer I want a “Most Subscribed” page that shows the top xxx most subscribed to comics. V: 100, E: 3, ROI: 33
7. As a store owner I would like to be able to easily find a customer’s orders by searching for a customer V: 20, E: 1, ROI: 20
8. As a store owner, I would like to change all currency decimal places to 2. V: 20, E: 1, ROI: 20
9. As a store owner I would like to be able to sort by title or sort by customer name for pulls. V: 20, E: 1, ROI: 20
10. As a store owner I would like a better navigation experience for settings V: 100, E: 5, ROI: 20
11. As a store owner I would like a report: Active Customers with Subscriptions V: 50, E: 3, ROI: 16.7
12. As a store owner, I don’t want customers with less than 10 subscriptions to be allowed to choose weekly or bi-weekly shipping. V: 50, E: 3, ROI: 16.7
13. As a store owner, I want to automatically send out a reminder email 7 days after the first invoice has gone out V: 50, E: 3, ROI: 16.5
14. As a store owner, I want to send an email to a customer when their subscriptions drop below 10 V: 50, E: 3, ROI: 16.7
15. As a store owner, I want to have specific store pages that I can put on my Manage Comics site V: 20, E: 3, ROI: 16.7
16. As a store owner, I want better email tracking V: 50, E: 5, ROI: 10
17. As a super admin, I want deletion handled more elegantly V: 50, E: 5, ROI: 10
18. As a customer user, I want to be able to log in to AllNewComics.com easier V: 50, E: 8, ROI: 6.25
19. As a customer, I would like to see all issue numbers V: 13, E: 3, ROI: 4.3
20. As a super admin, I want to automatically attach images. V: 13, E: 3, ROI: 4.3
21. As a store owner I want to set the # of most subscribed on the site. V: 3, E: 1, ROI: 3
22. As a store owner I would like to be able to refund a customer their subscription Deposit V: 13, E: 5, ROI: 2.6
23. As a store owner, I would like there to be alternatives for users without email addresses V: 8, E: 3, ROI: 2.6
24. As a customer, I want to be able to place a custom order and track it (Communication Log) V: 13, E: 5, ROI: 2.6
25. As a super admin, I want new 404, 422, and 500 pages. V: 8, E: 3, ROI: 2.6
26. As super admin, I want better email templates in Rails V: 8, E: 3, ROI: 2.6
27. As NorthIQ I want to generate invoices in Xero V: 8, E: 3, ROI: 2.6
28. As a customer I want to have a page I can share publicly with my list of subscriptions. V: 8, E: 3, ROI: 2.6
29. As a store owner I want a report that shows me the titles that have been removed from the store for the last x days V: 8, E: 3, ROI: 2.6
30. As a customer, I would like the option to get a message when my comics have been pulled V: 5, E: 3, ROI: 1.6
31. As a store owner I want to send an email Email — After 5 zero subscription nags, offer a refund V: 5, E: 3, ROI: 1.6
32. As a store owner I want to send an email to new customers with 0 subscriptions (5 times) V: 5, E: 3, ROI: 1.6
33. As a Super Admin, I want to make imports easier V: 13, E: 8, ROI: 1.63
34. As a store owner, I want to be able to customize any automatic emails V: 8, E: 5, ROI: 1.6

In July of 2017 we injected a few other features that we’ll be prioritizing because they address some immediate needs.

1. As NorthIQ, I want to be able to modify settings any store.
2. As NorthIQ I need to modify provinces into States/Provinces.
3. As NorthIQ, I do not want stores to be able to change their slug.
4. NorthIQ, I want my dashboard to show how many active subscribers the system has.
5. As NorthIQ I want to see how many active subscribers each Store has.
6. As NorthIQ, I want to use Wave Accounting to bill Manage Comics Stores
7. As a Store, I want to be able to select which shipping methods are available
8. As a store owner, I want a contact us page that keeps customer questions in Manage Comics
9. As a store owner, I want to add my social media sites to my page.
10. As a store owner, I don’t want to see cancelled orders in my main list.
11. As a store owner, I want my stores details in the meta description.
12. As a store owner, I want to upload and resize a Favicon/logo
13. As a store owner, I may have different ways of doing taxes.