Following our most recent webinar, “Products from Ideation to Creation” with an esteemed panel of industry specialists, here is a series of hot tips to get you on the right track for launch.
Developing a product can be an overwhelming prospect so, here is a quick way to learn about building those fundamental considerations and framework.
These tips are designed to position yourself before beginning to approach the right people that will grow this idea into a fully-fledged solution.
These tips are divided into three categories:
- Plan
- People
- Build
1. Plan
“If you’ve got vision mixed in with strategy, you find purpose for your project”
Before heading far down the path of any technology venture, consider the vision you have for this product. If you map where this product will go, then it will reach the correct destination. Otherwise it could easily divert the wrong way. From this illustration comes setting your mission, goals and brand intent. A good story will ensure this product is differentiated from the marketplace.
If there are seed funders or angel investors along for the journey, then creating business, marketing and financial plans are crucial.
It is critical to conduct as much market research as possible. Envision and research who your target audience is. If you’re unsure, reach out to the public to see who shows interest. Ensure that the product is unique or is solving a current problem to avoid duplicating efforts and producing a solution that already exists. Once you have a target audience in mind, run as much research as possible with low fidelity sketches and anything alike. The more questions asked in this stage, the less failings will occur at later, more costly stages.
2. People
“With a Vision and a Strategy in your build, you will find growth on your project”
Our next tip is to build a strong foundational team. This group will be the difference between a strong launch or frustrating iterative development lifecycles.
Consider
- A Coach: to guide you on the multi-faceted journey.
- Legal: Especially important when it comes to patenting and building corporate structures.
- DevOps Team: for the longevity of your venture. Setting the right technology, systems, equipment, and software applications in place from the beginning ensures agility and flexibility. It makes your business modern, clean, organised and provides the capability to change, grow or even descale, without having to re-innovate the technology and infrastructure supporting the business.
- Marketing: to ensure a lean process, engage marketing early to assist with market research and ensuring your brand is right for your audience. A strong marketing plan will compliment your business plan, and maximise brand exposure, awareness and community building when the prototype is ready to go.
3. Build
“A good vision mixed in with your build will give you freedom and revenue by creating an impactful product”
In this stage, an MVP – a Minimum Viable Product is a term and technique that will appear regularly. An MVP describes a product prototype with enough features to attract early-adopters and validate the idea. Designed to fail confidently and repeatedly to avoid mistakes in the long run where they end up being too large and too costly to correct, a fail-fast mentality.
Having a product to show and interact with is significant to validate its existence, receive valuable feedback and enhance credibility.
The three points listed above should be considered before even venturing onto the build of the product to save yourself time and money.
If you have any further questions on any parts, or on the topic, please contact us* and we will be happy to help.
Watch the webinar here:
