Need Faster Results? Consider a Product Mindset.
Learn more about the marketing levers to pull within your team and lead your business to growth.
If you’re frustrated with business being stagnant — or if you’re not seeing growth at the rate you feel you should — it may be time to take a step back to identify the specific marketing levers to pull that will lead to growth. We refer to this process as switching thinking to more of a “product mindset.”
So what do we mean by this term?
A product mindset focuses on desired outcomes and the quick, incremental ways to add value and work toward your goals. It’s an approach that’s solution-driven rather than capabilities-driven. To paraphrase Ian Malcom, Jeff Goldblum’s character in Jurassic Park, just because you can do it doesn’t mean you should.
Strategies help focus on the business outcomes the project needs to achieve. This mindset drives us to identify a solution that creates the fastest value, while continuing to improve how it does so through measurement and iteration. Be sure that your team takes accountability for the product, and keep in mind that scope, time, and budget are all impacted by the desired outcome. When your team embraces the product mindset, you focus on metrics that truly improve the business and drive revenue growth.
In short, the product mindset provides clarity. It also allows you to be more
nimble.
With the array of ways information can be delivered, a product mindset means a more fluid approach to problem solving. While this can be challenging, it’s important to evaluate how these new parameters create opportunities for better collaboration. Disregard the typical “assembly line” of work by waiting for everyone’s turn and instead embracing more focused moments of sharing across your entire team.
And speaking of delivery, let’s talk efficiency.
A product mindset also requires efficient workflows. (Remember how we mentioned being nimble earlier?) A clear understanding of goals and how to reach them improves communication and helps to reinforce the results must match the vision. An “efficiency gap” is created whenever a team’s execution breaks down due to a lack of knowledge or communication about purpose. Close this gap by explaining your decision-making in each step of the process. This subtle but important mindset shift means covering more ground with fewer iterations.
So where do we start?
All roles should have meaningful access to one another in the service of decision-making and brainstorming to solve the smaller challenges, which creates momentum to conquer bigger ones. It’s crucial to empower your team by encouraging collaboration and skilled problem-solving.
One strategy that’s highly recommended is using lightweight deliverables to make the process more transparent for the entire team. Demonstrating interactions in their simplest form will help to improve team communication. When the whole team gets to see the process, it takes the pressure off the “big reveal” and builds trust in team members to make informed decisions and solve problems. It may be a bit less climactic, but in the end it’s far more effective.
The real secret to innovation is connecting ideas and building the communication loop early by collaborating together as a team instead of only delegating siloed chunks of work to individuals on your team (i.e. the assembly line). We suggest reaching out for feedback from your team in non-disruptive ways by using tools such as Basecamp, Slack or Zoom. These platforms enable sharing information beyond your immediate team by including all necessary stakeholders.
RESOURCES
Here are some tools to help you take advantage the product mindset:
Articles
How to Build a Core Team That Can Scale as the Product Grows — In
this article, our own Marty Balkema shares some advice on how to put together a core team that can scale as the product grows.
A Product Mindset Epiphany — Teams who operate under a product
mindset offer tremendous value to the business as a whole. These are just a few examples of the benefits they bring. Here are six suggestions for how your team can embrace a product mindset.
Team Collaboration And Closing Efficiency Gaps In Responsive Design — Responsive design ushers in complexities that require more involved design and implementation processes. Let’s look at how these new challenges create opportunities to work together better.
Books
Rethink Your Marketing — Learn to cut through the noise to what truly moves the needle and drives revenue. This methodology delivers six strategies to identify the specific levers of your marketing that will lead to growth.
The Product Mindset: Succeed in the Digital Economy by Changing the Way Your Organization Thinks — The Product Mindset provides you with all the tools you’ll need to revitalize your company’s methodologies, reframe its culture, and help your company thrive in the digital marketplace.
The Innovator’s Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book that Will Change
the Way You Do Business — This book teaches you when to throw traditional management practices out the window, and focus on a strategy that will make your product a winner.
Podcasts
Talking Too Loud with Chris Savage — This podcast takes you inside the minds of entrepreneurs as they share the hilarious, informative, and most challenging aspects of building more human brands.
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