1. The Method Are Still the Same
The elements of creating great products and services remain the same. Qualitative (e.g. discussion forums) and quantitative (e.g. surveys) research are still the foundation for developing any product strategy. The difference is that online communities empower organizations to conduct these activities in less time, with a smaller budget, and more often.
2. Online Communities Makes Product Management Easier
Today, online customer communities allow product managers to use secure online groups and easy-to-use collaboration tools (along with proactive community management) to have conversations about market problems and get feedback on ideas through the product development process.
3. Discussions Are Key
Online communities only help innovate products and services if companies listen to their community. Similar to offline product management techniques, the most important component of listening and probing online is discussions. This includes customer forums and comment threads associated with files, videos, product ideas, and blog posts. These online conversations form the basis for understanding market problems, the competitive landscape, why you win deals, and why you lose.
4. Companies Need to Find Ways to Manage Data Better
Every organization will treat this challenge a little differently. The bottom line is that product managers need to be prepared to handle this valuable information in a way that is most usable in their planning and development processes.
5. Get the Market Data To The Right People At The Right Time
Your online customer community is giving you more data from your market. It is also allowing you to have discussions and validate product concepts more efficiently. An important step, often overlooked by businesses, is setting up processes to get the information that you are collecting and analyzing to the right people in the organization at the right point in the process. This usually means finding ways to effectively and consistently answer questions from your product development team throughout the development process about what the market wants and needs.
6. It is Ok to Get Started with Small Steps
Like most social business initiatives, starting small allows companies to grow buy-in, minimize risk, and work out the kinks in the process. A great way to get started using your online community to improve product management is to validate existing product ideas. Take your top features planned for the next version of your product or service and have a targeted customer group or advisory board vote in your online community on their top picks and explain their votes in the comments.
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