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ProductCamp Austin Winter 2009

You may know that Austin led the global product management community in holding the first ProductCamp . About ninety product management and other professionals spent a Saturday in June in the air conditioned comfort of the St. Edwards Professional Education Center. ProductCamp is like BarCamp, an informal conference in which professionals meet to share ideas about technologies, tools, and practices. I'm pleased to announce that Austin's second ProductCamp is taking place in January. We are expecting over 175 of Austin's most talented product management, marketing, and product development professionals to attend. This time the event will be at the UT College of Communications building. WHAT: ProductCamp Austin WHEN: January 24, 2009 WHERE: University of Texas, College of Communications CMB Building (Studios 4B-4E) 201 W. Dean Keeton St. Austin, Texas 78712 For more information on the event, or to sign up to lead a session, visit the wiki . Register for free here . Pragma...

Brands and Categories

Laura Ries makes two primary points in her recent blog entry : If your product is innovative or the established brand leader, it should own not just a word or idea in the mind of the customer, but should also "own" the category itself. I.e., customers and prospects should equate or strongly associate the category with the product. If your product owns a dying category and you introduce a new product in new or healthy category, don't put the new product under the same brand umbrella. Instead, create an entirely new brand . Some choice quotes: [L]eaders many times become the generic for that category. The brand becomes a short-hand device for talking about and asking for a particular category. Kodak is not in trouble because people don't love the Kodak brand anymore. Kodak is in trouble because people don't use conventional film cameras anymore. Moving Kodak to the digital category makes no sense at all. When your brand owns a category in the mind and your catego...

Seth Godin on Paying for Logos

In August of 2005, I pondered , "Why Pay for a Logo?" Logos can be important, but it doesn't require deep thought to create them. It's just a matter of following certain simple (albeit counterintuitive) guidelines . Now Seth Godin recommends : [T]ake the time and money and effort you'd put into an expensive logo and put them into creating a product and experience and story that people remember instead. But when you do choose a logo, keep in mind that your impulse to create one with "meaning" is probably a bad idea .

Solution Management

Solution selling is a sales approach in which the sales person probes into the prospect's pain points and puts together a package of offerings to address them. Rather than selling a single offering, the sales person combines several offerings for the specific customer. (For a comprehensive introduction to solution selling, I recommend SPIN Selling .) Just as sales people should consider solution selling, product managers should consider solution management . Consider how some companies structure their product marketing. A friend of mine works for a company that sells hardware, software, and services. Each hardware, software, or service offering is a "product" in this company's terminology. The company's product managers manage these individual offerings. They determine the roadmap for each product, communicate the requirements to developers, and govern the marketing of each product. The company's business clients, however, almost never buy any individu...

Scott Sehlhorst on SaaS

On his Tyner Blain blog, Scott Sehlhorst has a richly informative entry on software as a service (SaaS) . What makes his treatment of the topic noteworthy is his focus on practical customer benefit rather than on the hype that typically surrounds SaaS. Based on Scott's entry, here is how I boil down the problems with licensed software that SaaS solves for customers: Deployment time and expense. When a new version of the software comes out, it can take considerable time and money to roll the software out, especially in an enterprise environment. With SaaS, upgrades require little or no deployment time or expense for the customer. Administration time and expense. Typically, when software is installed at an enterprise site, administrators monitor and manage the installation to ensure it is functioning properly. With SaaS, the provider handles site administration. Lack of accessibility. If the software is installed locally on individual computers, and a customer needs to use s...

iPhone Predictions: A Post-Mortem

Now that we have had more than a year to assess the success of Apple's iPhone, let's see how the predictions of the marketing gurus panned out. Laura Ries predicted that Apple would initially sell a lot of iPhones, but that ultimately the product would flop. I think it's safe to say that the iPhone has not flopped. Apple sold four million of them in a recent six month period. Ries has recently revisited her prediction . Seth Godin predicted that the iPhone would be successful, and that Apple would sell more than two million of them in 2007. I suspect he was right about the 2007 sales. From a marketing perspective, the most important observation about the iPhone is that it has not turned out to be so much of a convergence device. While much of Apple's initial marketing touted the iPhone's merging of music, Internet, and phone capabilities, that perception in the mind of the consumer has not taken hold. In fact, 51% of iPhone purchasers say they will use an iP...

Pearls of Wisdom from Stacey Weber

Are you an executive who has recently adopted Scrum or another agile approach to product management and development? If so, Pragmatic Marketing's Stacey Weber has some important observations that will help you understand the roles and skills you'll need on your team. (See my concise description of Scrum first.) First, your product manager (often equated, unfortunately, with the product owner in Scrum) should focus on the problems to be solved, not features: How often have you already envisioned the solution before you’ve stated the problem? Begin with the problem-oriented requirement: “Every [frequency], [persona] has [problem] with [result].” Then work with a user interaction designer or business analyst to define the solution. and Take a look at your team’s backlog. Is it features? Or, even finer-grained tasks than that? A Product Manager’s primary responsibility is to know the market – to discover urgent, pervasive problems that people are willing to pay to have solved. ...

What is Scrum?

Scrum is an agile approach to product development that is centered around brief, informal stand-up meetings. The term "scrum" originated in the game of rugby. A rugby scrum is a way of resuming a game that has paused due to an accidental foul or the ball having gone out of play. Opposing players engage head-to-head and compete for possession of the ball, which is thrown into the fray. A "media scrum" is an impromptu press conference in which the media gather around a political figure and bombard her with questions. Thus "scrum" has come to refer more generally to a short, informal gathering. In the Scrum approach to product development, scrums are frequent (often daily) stand-up meetings in which each member of the product team states his immediate goal and any risks or obstacles he is facing. The scrums typically start at precisely the same time every day and are often time-boxed to 15-20 minutes. Other Scrum practices include: Iterations ("spri...

Dancer Test

Are you left-brained or right-brained? Supposedly, your brain lateralization determines how you view this animation. Some people see her rotating clockwise. Others see her rotating counter-clockwise. Some see her unpredictably changing the direction of her rotation. Supposedly, people who see clockwise rotation are right brained. People who see counter-clockwise rotation are left brained. I originally came across this animation here .

Brand Tags

If you haven't already seen Seth Godin's blog entry on it and checked out Brand Tags , take a look now. A brand is not just a name or a logo. It's a set of associations imprinted in the mind of a customer. At the Brand Tags site, you can say what various popular brands mean to you. You can also see what words other people have associated with brand names. Best of all, you can view a set of these "brand tags" and guess the associated brand name.

What Dimensions Are Best for a Logo?

You're choosing a logo for your company. In all likelihood, you either: Have some creative folks on your team design it. Hire a creative marketing firm to design it. Then, of course, your team sits down, reviews a bunch of candidate logos, and each one of you spews out a bunch of thoroughly unscientific, personal opinions about which one is "better". Fans of this blog know (because I have beaten them over the head with it) that the best logos are blank slates (where the non-name portion of the logo conveys little or nothing about your company or product). And you generally should choose a logo with a single color that is the opposite of a major competitor's . But how tall, and how wide, should your logo be? Al Ries tells us logotype should fit your eyes : 1 unit high and 2 1/4 units wide.

ProductCampAustin

You may have heard of BarCamp , informal conferences in which developers meet to share ideas about technologies, tools, and practices. Spurred by Paul Young (of Product Beautiful fame), a group of product managers in Austin is organizing ProductCampAustin , which is a similar event for product managers. WHAT: ProductCampAustin WHEN: June 14, 2008 WHERE: St. Edwards University's Professional Education Center (PEC) 9420 Research Blvd Echelon III Building Austin, Texas 78759 Sponsors include Pragmatic Marketing , NetStreams , AIPMM , and AustinPMM Forum , Seilevel , and Austin Ventures . There are two ways you can get more info or get involved: Go to the wiki (collaborative web site) and sign up as a participant. Join the planning group on Google. Everyone interested in product management, marketing, and development processes is invited, but we encourage attendees to participate (volunteer for setup/teardown, speak, lead a roundtable, set up wifi...

Focus vs. Innovation?

Idris Mootee recently blogged a response to an AdAge article (paid subscription required) by Al Ries. Here are some excerpts from the Ries article: "What makes a powerful automobile brand today is not innovation, but a narrow focus on an attribute or a segment of the market." "Innovations outside of a brand’s core position can undermine a brand." "Most brands don't need innovations; they need focus. They need to figure out what they stand for and then what they need to sacrifice to get there." Yep, sounds like vintage Ries. But Mootee disagrees: Mr. Ries is so wrong on this one. Mootee counters: What the automobile industry needs today is NOT a narrow focus or an attribute or another brand. They have been doing that for decades and look at Detroit today. Really? When I ponder the Detroit automobile industry, I think "scattered", not "focused". This counterexample from Mootee is not convincing. As a matter of fact, it tends to supp...

Enable Your Product Manager to Be Strategic

Pragmatic Marketing's Steve Johnson has written an e-book, The Strategic Role of Product Management . In it, Steve argues that strong product management is key to the success of a company when it is strategic and focuses on identifying and solving market problems. A key graph from the book is: Increasingly we see companies creating a VP of Product Management, a department at the same level in the company as the other major departments. This VP focuses the product management group on the business of the product. The product management group interviews existing and potential customers, articulates and quantifies market problems in the business case and market requirements, defines standard procedures for product delivery and launch, supports the creation of collateral and sales tools by Marketing Communications, and trains the sales teams on the market and product. Product Management looks at the needs of the entire business and the entire market. What can you, as a corporate execut...

"Jewelry Central": A Good Brand Name?

Not. Seth Godin rants on generic brand names that append a bland word ("central") to a descriptive word ("jewelry"): Jewelry Central is a really bad brand name. So are Party Land, Computer World, Modem Village, House of Socks and Toupee Town. It's a bad brand name because Central or Land or World are meaningless. They add absolutely no value to your story, they mean nothing and they are interchangeable. "Here honey, I bought you these cheap earrings at Diamond World!" Not only are they bland, but you can't even remember one over the other. This is the absolute last refuge of a marketer who has absolutely nothing to say and can't even find the guts to stand for what they do. It's just generic. In the past, Godin has recommended names that yield very few Google search results. Such names are almost never descriptive or generic.

Innovation Games Class in Austin

Innovation and agilist extraordinare, Luke Hohmann, will be teaching a two-day class on innovation games in Austin . I have a copy of Luke's book, Innovation Games: Creating Breakthrough Products Through Collaborative Play . It contains the "rules" for a dozen games that you can play with your customers and design team to better understand your market and create innovative solutions to their problems. Here are some of the details of the event : When: March 18th-19th, 2008 (Tues/Weds) Where: Renaissance Hotel, 9721 Arboretum Boulevard, Austin TX, 512-795-6006. Price: $1695/person Luke Hohmann, author of “Innovation Games: Creating Breakthrough Products Through Collaborative Play” will be teaching an intensive, two-day class based on the material found in the book of the same name. Used by corporations such as SAP, Rally Software Development, QUALCOMM, Emerson Climate Technologies, Genesyslabs, HP, Aladdin Knowledge Systems, Innovation Games® have been featured in Software ...

Vodka Delusions

Sorry, but Grey Goose is mediocre. Ditto for Ketel One. At least according to a tasting panel at the New York Times . The tasting panel sampled 21 unflavored vodkas, mostly on the high end. But for kicks, they decided to include lowly Smirnoff in the mix. The results? [A]t the end of our tasting it was Smirnoff at the top of our list, ahead of many other names that are no doubt of higher status in stylish bars and lounges. Some of those names did not even make our Top 10. Grey Goose from France, one of the most popular vodkas, was felt to lack balance and seemed to have more than a touch of sweetness. Ketel One from the Netherlands, another top name, was felt to be routine and sharp, although Mr. Klemm did describe it as "a good mixer." Here were the top ten: Smirnoff United States Grain Wyborowa Poland Single Estate Rye Belvedere Poland Rye Absolut Sweden Level Grain Hangar 1 United States Straight Wheat and Grain Vox Netherlands Wheat Olifant Netherlands Grain...

Interaction Design: the Neglected Skill

Your product development organization has a big, gaping hole in it. (Be prepared to feel defensive as you continue reading.) One of the most important roles in product development is the role of interaction designer. An interaction designer designs how the users will interact with the product and conceptualize the tasks they perform. He decides whether, for example, the user interface will be command driven, object oriented (clicking on objects then specifying what to do with them), or wizard based. The interaction designer decides the individual steps in the use cases. Every company has one or more people that play the interaction designer role. Usually, those people have little or no expertise in interaction design. Sadly, they typically don't even realize how unqualified they are. Let's see who typically plays the role at companies. Engineer . An engineer is an expert on building what is designed. Yes, an engineer may know how to design the internal structure of the hardware...

Jeff Lash on Qualitative Research

I had the pleasure of meeting Jeff Lash when he visited Austin a couple of weeks ago. Jeff authors the How to Be a Good Product Manager blog . Not to put words in his mouth, but I think Jeff and I share an affinity for the more strategic aspects of product management. I was happy but not surprised to read Jeff's recent entry on qualitative and quantitative research. It looks like he and I agree on the importance of qualitative research and the complementarity of both types of research .

Are Expensive Wines Better?

Researchers at the California Institute of Technology have confirmed the notion that the price tag on a wine affects people's perception of it. In fact, they genuinely experience more pleasure drinking wines they believe are more expensive: The part of the brain that reacts to a pleasant experience responded more strongly to pricey wines than cheap ones — even when tasters were given the same vintage in disguise. and A $90 wine was provided marked with its real price and again marked $10, while another was presented at its real price of $5 and also marked $45.The testers' brains showed more pleasure at the higher price than the lower one, even for the same wine . . . . If someone else on the executive team urges you to lower the price on your product, be careful .

Limitations of "The system shall . . . ."

Is your product manager composing documents with hundreds of sentences beginning with "The system shall . . . ." or "The product shall . . . ."? If so, she should consider a different approach. Back in 2004, Mike Cohn wrote an interesting article on requirements and agile development. Here is an interesting excerpt from the article: [C]onsider the following requirements: 3.4) The product shall have a gasoline-powered engine. 3.5) The product shall have four wheels. 3.5.1) The product shall have a rubber tire mounted to each wheel. 3.6) The product shall have a steering wheel. 3.7) The product shall have a steel body. By this point, I suppose images of an automobile are floating around your head. Of course, an automobile satisfies all of the requirements listed above. The one in your head may be a bright red convertible, while I might envision a blue pickup. Presumably the differences between your convertible and my pickup are covered in additional requirements st...

Positioning the Democratic Presidential Candidates

I watched the New Hampshire debates last night. What struck me on the Democratic side was the extent to which the candidates stuck to their positioning . Three of the candidates have clearly staked out their territory in the mind of the voter. What do the Democratic candidates stand for in the mind of the voter? Barack Obama stands for "hope" in the mind of the voter. Last night, he repeatedly used words like "empowerment", "getting beyond cynicism", and "bringing people together". The notion that he is an agent of change is an undercurrent of this theme. He wants voters to think he can change the divisive nature of decision-making in Washington into a more inclusive one. His being a fresh face strengthens this message. Voters perceive the usual faces as partisan squabblers that can't accomplish great things. John Edwards embodies a "fight the power" mentality. He is the populist of the group, and he spoke of battling speci...