AMA: Square Product Manager, Abhiroop Basu on Product Strategy

A single customer conversation will enable you to generate a product roadmap for the next 1 year. While looking at competitors, speaking to thought leaders and industry experts, and prototyping new tech will always have their place, nothing beats speaking to a customer to generate new feature ideas. After all, who better to understand what's missing from your product than the ones who will use it most. Now, it's critical to understand that you should never just build whatever your customers ask ...Read More

Validating your product strategy is essential, particularly before investing in new features. There are two techniques I use to ensure my strategy is most effective: Customer validation: Talk directly to potential customers to understand their needs, wants, and pain points. This helps you assess if your product idea aligns with their problems and if they would be willing to pay for your solution. In addition, conduct user testing by developing prototypes and getting real people to interact with ...Read More

Release planning requires 5 things: Define the goals of the project. What outcomes are you hoping to achieve? Clearly articulate your success metrics Understand your customer needs. Conduct qualitative (surveys, interviews, etc) as well as quantitative (funnel analysis, engagement metrics, etc) research to better understand what you should build. Prioritize your roadmap. Create a roadmap and use a prioritization framework (RICE, Kano) to create your roadmap. Next break down the large scale visio ...Read More

Constant innovation is exciting! One of the most exciting aspects of being a product manager in software is the constant innovation. Every day I come across new a technology or process that can improve the product I'm working on. Not only do I need to stay on top of what's new, I need to have a perspective on how it can be incorporated into what I'm building. For example, despite the hype, it's hard to overstate how important AI is for technology in general. It is game changing. Automation has a ...Read More

Those aren't mutually exclusive. But, customer retention is a marathon, while differentiation is a sprint. Customer retention is crucial for long-term success, while differentiation can provide a short-term boost. I typically follow a simple framework when determining what to invest in: Start by looking at the top customer requests and compare our product capabilities with those of our closest competitors Next list the features based on which are "table stakes" (i.e. all your competitors offer t ...Read More

Customers don’t care about your solution — they care about their problems. Dave McClure's most famous quote is essential to build products people will actually use. I hate to bash other PMs and their products, but I couldn't help but laugh when I first heard about Juicero. In 2016, Juicero launched a wi-fi enabled juicer. At $700 it was nearly the cost of an iPhone. What was the game changing solution that Juicero offered? You would buy proprietary juice packets from Juicero and the Juciero woul ...Read More

There are three steps I typically use when developing a strategy for a new product: Identify vision and goals: Start by defining the core problem your product aims to address in the market. What need are you fulfilling for users? Who is your ideal customer and what are their pain points? Next write out your vision, goals, success metrics, and vision. This will motivate your team and hold yourself accountable. Understand the market: Once you've identified the "why", conduct research to understand ...Read More