Basic concepts, Positioning, Saturation levels, Design considerations, COO effect, Strategic alternatives, Global products and brands, Building brands in International markets, Standardization versus adaptation.
2. High Level Definition
Product management is an organisational lifecycle function within a
company dealing with the planning, forecasting, and production, or
marketing of a product or products at all stages of the product lifecycle.
Similarly, product lifecycle management (PLM) integrates people, data,
processes and business systems. It provides product information for
companies and their extended supply chain enterprise.
3. What Product Manager does
The role may consist of product development and product marketing with the objective of
maximizing sales revenues, market share, and profit margins. Product management also
involves elimination decisions. The product manager is often responsible for analyzing
market conditions and defining features or functions of a product and for overseeing the
production of the product. The role of product management spans many activities from
strategic to tactical and varies based on the organizational structure of the company. To
maximize the impact and benefits to an organization, Product management must be an
independent function separate on its own.
While involved with the entire product lifecycle, the product management's main focus is on
driving new product development.
4. Product Management Contd
Depending on the company size and history, product management has a variety of
functions and roles. Sometimes there is a product manager, and sometimes the
role of product manager is shared by other roles. Frequently there is Profit and
Loss (P&L) responsibility as a key metric for evaluating product manager
performance. In some companies, the product management function is the hub of
many other activities around the product. In others, it is one of many things that
need to happen to bring a product to market and actively monitor and manage it
in-market. In very large companies, the product manager may have effective
control over shipment decisions to customers, when system specifications are not
being met.
5. Product Marketing
Product management often serves an inter-disciplinary role, bridging gaps within
the company between teams of different expertise, most notably between
engineering-oriented teams and commercially oriented teams. For example,
product managers often translate business objectives set for a product by
Marketing or Sales into engineering requirements (sometimes called a Technical
Specification). Conversely, they may work to explain the capabilities and
limitations of the finished product back to Marketing and Sales (sometimes called
a Commercial Specification). In most technology companies, most product
managers possess knowledge in business, user experience, software
programming
6. Product Marketing
Product Life Cycle considerations
Product differentiation
Product naming and branding
Product positioning and outbound messaging
Promoting the product externally with press, customers, and partners
Conducting customer feedback and enabling (pre-production, beta software)
Launching new products to market
Monitoring the competition
7. Product Development
Identifying new product candidates
Testing products
Defining product requirements
Determining business-case and feasibility
Gathering the voice of customers
Scoping and defining new products at high level
Evangelizing new products within the company
Building product roadmaps, particularly technology roadmapsEnsuring products
are within optimal price margins and up to specifications
Ensuring products are manufacturable
8. Inbound vs Outbound
Many refer to inbound as product development & outbound product marketing
functions.
Inbound product management is the "radar" of the organization and involves absorbing
information like customer research, competitive intelligence, industry analysis, trends,
economic signals and competitive activity as well as documenting requirements and
setting product strategy.
In comparison, outbound activities are focused on distributing or pushing messages,
training sales people, go to market strategies and communicating messages through
channels like advertising, PR and events.
9.
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11. Country-of-origin effect
The country-of-origin effect (COE), also known as the made-in image and the
nationality bias is a psychological effect describing how consumers' attitudes,
perceptions and purchasing decisions are influenced by products' country of origin
labeling ;
Country of origin labelling originated in 1887 when the British government, in an
effort to reduce sales of German and other non-English products to English
consumers, passed a law requiring products manufactured outside England to be
labeled with their country of origin
Discussion : ---
13. Standardisation vs Adaption
In international marketing, companies are involved in making global decisions in one or
more variables of the marketing mix. Product standardization strategy refers to a
uniform representation of all aspects of the product such as the quality, the materials
that had been used, product name and packaging for all markets, regardless of the
location around the world. In the contrast, the most challenging decision that a
company may face in internationalization is the degree of standardization or adaptation
in its operations. The question of standardization or adaptation affects all avenues of a
business’ operations, such as R&D, finance, production, organizational structure,
procurement, and the marketing mix. Whether a company chooses to standardize or
adapt its operations depends on its attitudes toward different cultures.
14. Product standardization
Product standardization is an efficient method to reduce costs and increase
quality. By minimizing the differences in your products, you are able to rapidly
increase production, streamline distribution, decrease raw material costs and
reinforce product branding. The best product standardization strategies allow you
to balance the need for targeted adaptation with the cost savings of
standardization.
Piston industry
Nut & Bolt industry
17. Target Market
Target market involves breaking a market into segments and then concentrating
marketing efforts on one or a few key segments.
Ex: Toothpaste companies mostly focus on the different type of market
segmentation in order to stay ahead of competitors.
18. Package & Design
Changing the packaging of the product could confuse some long time, dedicated
users. Then again a simple change in packaging base on the taste of the market
may help to boost sales of the item in other cases. Certain colours, symbols,
words, and imagery can be offensive or inappropriate in different countries.
Ex: Most of the perfumes, cosmetics, shampoo & soap companies use the
different design & packaging in different countries.
