We talk about the different stages of the product development lifecycle, and what to do in each one of them.

1. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
Product Management
Product Development Lifecycle

2. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
The
Beginning
The product development cycle can have different beginnings:
● High-level idea for a whole new product.
● Problem in an existing product.
● An improvement we want to do in an existing product.
These ideas can come from any stakeholder: employees, founders,
focus groups, SWOT analysis workshops, visiting conferences, and
more.

3. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
Research
the
Market
Here, we take the idea/problem/improvement we have from the
previous stage, and we check thoroughly what’s available in the market.
This stage is most often overlooked by product managers,
entrepreneurs, CEOs and more.
● Identify competitor products or features.
● Speak with people about that idea. One person doing the market
research is not enough.
● Don’t forget to check patents.

4. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
Idea
Generation
After we finished the market research, we gather all the product
stakeholders and generate lower-level ideas for our product, having in
mind what we know about other solutions in the market.
Here new ideas, features and business models are being brainstormed.
Open the minds for even unusual ideas and solutions.
Increase the creativity of the product stakeholders.
If you haven’t done SWOT analysis yet - do it.
Think what will your MVP (first version of the product) will be like. MVP
is the minimal-first-version product that you can release that has a
potential to get good customer feedback.

5. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
Idea
Screening
There are many great ideas that are great in theory, but do not meet the
needs of an organization, investor or profitability margins.
A $5M idea can be a great idea for an individual, but not for a VC
backed company.
So, after you have the idea in mind, you need to screen the ideas by:
● Expected revenues, size and profitability.
● Growth.
● Costs and capital needed.
● Time to money.
● Pricing. See other presentation on that topic.

6. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
Idea
Validation
Before we spend energy (=time and money), we want to imagine what
would happen if we had finished creating our product.
● Speak with people and potential customers. Would they use the
product if it were available today?
● How much would they pay if it existed?
● Conduct focus groups to get more opinions on the solution you
have in mind.
● If possible, create mock-ups and prototypes to do usability testing.

7. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
Think of the
MVP
At this stage we have the idea in mind, we have researched the market,
we think it can meet our business needs and we have spoken with
people to get an external validation.
Now we need to outline the MVP product: The first version we will
release and on which we will get feedbacks from customers.
Good feedback will increase our motivation and provide a validation for
our thesis. Bad feedback will force us to think what we did wrong. Is it a
bad idea, or was the execution bad?
At this stage you are designing the MVP.
Roadmap, specifications, backlog, prioritization, metrics and KPIs. See
other presentation on this topic.

8. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
MVP
Implementation
Here you implement the MVP.
On how to do it, and what are the different development methodologies-
see my other presentations.

9. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
Beta Launch or
Creating MVP II or
Full launch
Here you need to decide if you are ready to market, launch and sell
your MVP to the target customers, or if you don’t think the MVP is
completed enough to be ready to go to the market.
See other presentation on product launching.

10. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
Gathering Feedback
(Product-Market Fit)
● Product analytics: Traction, retention, churn, etc.
● Customer feedbacks. Speak with the customers.
● Case studies, success stories.
● Check your expected KPIs and metrics vs the actual metrics.
Here you need to think if:
● The idea was fundamentally bad. Or;
● The idea was good, but we need to pivot the MVP. Or;
● Everything was good and we need to move on to version 2.

11. Product Management | Product Development Lifecycle Nadav Benedek
Repeat the
Process
Lather, rinse and repeat the process.