Product Roadmap Software
Product roadmap software helps to streamline the process of creating detailed plans with task assignments covering every aspect of the product’s lifecycle. This particular software solution lets you record all sorts of information about the product, including the strategy taken, the features, improvements, releases and user feedback.
In addition to managing and detailing every stage of the product’s lifecycle, these software solutions also allow you to effectively communicate the product strategy—and its goals and objectives—to team members, colleagues, the management and stakeholders. It essentially gives you a complete view of the various stages of a product currently in development.
The software works as a product management solution, enabling product managers and development teams to keep track of multiple products at once. The platform provides very important details, which include product features, task status indicators, goals, timelines and budget allocation. Just like any management system, it facilitates collaboration among stakeholders, both internal and external.
Say you want to collate crowdsourcing ideas or obtain user feedback for valuable insights you can use to improve your product, a fully-featured product roadmap software solution can help you with that. As a road mapping tool, the platform allows executives, engineers and sales teams to communicate product strategy, features and releases through the internal roadmap. The external roadmap allows you to incorporate valuable customer feedback based on user experiences and benefits.
The software also enables product managers to allocate key resources to different phases, including the high-level stages of the product development process, and then track their progress.
ProductPlan makes it simple for teams of all sizes to build and visualise detailed roadmaps, enabling them to easily share strategies across their entire business.
Product roadmap software solutions help you visualize not just your product’s lifecycle but your business goals as well. By utilizing the different features offered by the best-in-class product roadmap systems in the market, you can track product requirements and manage your available resources more effectively, especially during the development stages.
The platform also provides users with a shared workspace, which means team members, developers and managers can discuss ideas more efficiently, provide suggestions and collaborate more effectively on project trajectory and execution. ProductPlan, Aha! and Craft.io are three great examples of a product roadmap software solution.
ProductPlan, more specifically, is a user-friendly solution for product managers and developers. It can be used for planning, communicating and visualizing product and service strategies by way of beautiful roadmaps. The user-friendly nature of the platform comes from its drag-and-drop feature, which makes it easier and more convenient for users to create workable plans and organize them on the go.
There are other features and functionalities that come with product roadmap software solutions. These should give you an idea of how companies, product managers and developers leverage the platform to achieve their business goals. The following are some of the common features and tools you can expect from a product roadmap solution:
The platform allows you to add custom workflows or adjust or modify the existing workflows for different products. This includes records for various data points associated with each specific product such as features, improvements, releases and goals.
When you have a tool that lets you add or modify custom workflows, it shouldn’t be surprising to have a function that lets you create and manage tasks as well. The platform enables you to create task lists via the drag-and-drop feature. Through this function, you can prioritize tasks and monitor their progress using customizable time frames on a monthly or quarterly basis.
When it comes to product management, there’s usually more than one individual involved in the development process. More often than not, you will be dealing with multiple team members working on the same project. This is where useful collaboration tools come in handy. The tools allow you to share and review roadmaps with both internal and external stakeholders. Users may also add useful comments and communicate in real-time through live chat to discuss product strategy, ideas and potential issues.
You might consider this feature to be the bread and butter of product roadmap software solutions. It is a tool that allows you to create product planning boards where your team members and other collaborators can share ideas, discuss key initiatives, as well as prioritize product features for future launches.
If you’re a product manager, for instance, you can use this function to create and share reports to your superiors and stakeholders. You will be able to provide them with easily digestible reports through charts, graphs and lists. All this can be achieved by simply combining different roadmap views for comprehensive data analysis.
Most top-tier product roadmap software solutions in the market come with open APIs and built-in integration capabilities. This means you can easily perform seamless data sharing with other product management apps, bug and issue tracking platforms and document sharing tools.
Product roadmap software helps users, specifically product developers and managers, set goals and requirements for their team and collaborators. The platform allows for a bird’s eye view of the product development process and its entire lifecycle, from inception to the launching of the product. Some key benefits of using a product roadmap solution include:
Clear view of product lifecycles – This is a no brainer. It is what these platforms are ultimately designed for, providing you with a clear picture of the development process and the entire lifecycle of your product, from start to finish. Regardless of how many teams or individuals are working on the product, you will always have a common platform to communicate and collaborate so that tasks are always in line with product requirements and your business goals.
Accessibility of product roadmap – The platform allows you to access and modify product roadmaps from virtually anywhere and at any time. Most product roadmap platforms are cloud-hosted, which means you can access product information and make modifications using any internet-enabled devices, including smartphones and tablets. This is especially beneficial if you’re working with team members from different geographical locations.
Access to valuable user insights – With external roadmaps, you will have the ability to share certain product development information with customers and gain valuable user feedback based on their experiences. This will help make sure your product strategy and goals are always in line with consumer needs and expectations, especially during the later development process.
Agile product roadmaps – Product development can be a difficult and cumbersome process when you’re working with multiple individuals and collaborators spread across different locations. Utilizing manual methods and spreadsheets just won’t cut it anymore. Fully-featured product roadmap software allows you to make any necessary changes to your product plan and strategy during any stage of your product development process.
The agility the platform allows is just not comparable to any manual method, from task management to real-time communication and effective collaboration. The bottom line is product roadmap software solutions are extremely useful to any company looking to produce products and/or services in the most cost-effective and efficient way.
