The Quest to Product Discovery
By Anamaria Erascu, Business Analyst, Cognizant Softvision
Why risk creating a feature or a product that nobody wants when you can first validate that the need really exists and your solution solves it? The key is product discovery — a method of learning about what your end users really need so that you build only relevant features and products that are actually useful for them.
The Double Diamond model is a popular approach for conducting product discovery:
1. Discover
The product discovery process starts with understanding the high level end users’ needs you are trying to address.
2. Define
2.1 After you understand the needs you are solving for, define them in a clear sentence. This is your customer problem statement.
2.2 You then need to validate that it’s worth solving that particular problem both for your users (how big the pain is) and for your organization (how much value solving it would bring).
2.3 Then prioritize which one of the identified problems you should address first.
3. Develop
3.1 In this stage, you brainstorm how you can best solve the main user needs you have decided to focus on.
3.2 After identifying possible solutions, prioritize them and craft minimum criteria for success (MSC) so that you can validate how each initiative performed after being tested.
3.3 Run experiments and test your main solution ideas. The experiment could mean a minimum viable product, a wireframe, a mockup, an interactive prototype or even a competitor’s product, while the test could be done as an A/B testing, customer interviews or others, depending on what you’re trying to learn.
The main objective here is to validate your solution before going into delivery, so make sure to compare your results with your minimum criteria for success.
3.4 Next, prioritize the solution that performed best and move it to the next stage or, if none of them achieved the MSC, you should brainstorm new ideas or even take a step back and analyze the problem again– maybe it’s not as important for your users as you initially thought it is or maybe you didn’t define it right in the first place.
4. Deliver
Start with delivering a minimum viable product (MVP), which is the version of your product with just enough essential features that validate your product idea. You want an MVP that you can deliver by investing the minimum amount of resources. In essence, your MVP could be the solution you already validated at the previous stage.
The product discovery process is not over after your MVP is implemented. It should not be a one time thing. Continuous product discovery means applying the product discovery framework throughout the product life cycle. It happens continuously alongside development.
The objective of product discovery is not necessarily to deliver features, but to promote a learning environment that will help you to constantly improve your product.
Resources & further reading
- Learn product discovery methods
- A step-by-step guide for conducting better product discovery
- Product Discovery — Why, How, When and many others — answered!
- The Product Discovery
- Creating value with continuous discovery — a discussion with Teresa Torres
- Listen to Teresa Torres’ talk “The What & Why of Continuous Discovery” at Programmers’ Week — Product Day, Cognizant Softvision’ Annual Tech event.
