The Importance of Demand Type in Product Management

The right approach for a product to win in the market depends on a number of different factors. One factor relates to the different type of buyer demand that is needed for the product to sell — at SiriusDecisions, we call this Demand Type. Obviously, your approach to a product that is completely new to the world and revolutionary is going to be very different than one that is in a very crowded, competitive, mature marketplace.

In many cases, product managers think about these sort of considerations, though usually subconsciously and informally. However, if you explicitly define the demand type, it allows you to ensure alignment across the team on how you’re going to approach everything from the financial model and pricing to positioning and segmentation to go-to-market approach and future roadmap.

In my post The Importance of Demand Type in Product Management, I outline a few things that product managers should be thinking about for each of the different demand types. And if demand type is new to you, we’ve got an overview of the three demand type categories as well.

Austin and Atlanta ProductCamps

Just because it’s summer, that hasn’t stopped the ProductCamp movement. It seems like the warmer the weather gets, the more ProductCamps there are on the calendar.

If you’re not familiar with ProductCamps, they are free “un-conferences” organized at a grassroots level. Instead of traditional conferences, where the schedule and speakers are selected by a small group and announced in advance, at a ProductCamp, all of the attendees (or, technically ,”participants”) show up the morning of and vote on what sessions they’d like to see on the schedule. Sound a bit strange? Well, it is, but they’re great fun, and they are fantastic opportunities to “talk shop,” learn from and network with others in the product management community.

ProductCamp Austin is one of the oldest and biggest ProductCamps, and I’m excited to be attending the next one on July 20. If you’re in the Austin area, you should definitely sign up — registration is now open. I’m looking forward to connecting with some old friends and meeting a lot of new faces. Let me know if you’ll be there and we can on plan on meeting in person.

I’ve also got my calendar blocked for the next Atlanta ProductCamp on August 17. Though the registration isn’t open just yet, you can sign up for their mailing list to be notified. Again — if you’ll be there, let me know so I can put a face with an email address / Twitter handle.

What about if you’re not in Austin or Atlanta, or can’t travel there? Check the global ProductCamp schedule to see when there will be one in your area. None listed? Organize your own!

What’s Hot on Twitter

Here are a few of my tweets which have generated the most interest over the past few weeks; to get these in real-time, follow me at @jefflash:

• If you don’t have clear goals before a product launch, how will you (& your boss & exec team) know whether it was successful? #prodmgmt (permalink)
• Does your product suck? Stop adding new features and “zoom in” instead http://j.mp/11UwOMw via @andrewchen #prodmgmt (permalink)
• Innovation is About Behavior, Not Products: True innovators get people to do new things, not just buy new stuff http://j.mp/19K2rgB (permalink)
• Beware the Cannibal In Your Product Line; a good read on #innovation, new product dev & incremental value http://j.mp/14BkQIs #prodmgmt (permalink)
• Musings of a Software Development Manager: Organisational Structure: Product Teams http://j.mp/196cts5 #prodmgmt (permalink)
• “A product roadmap is a plan for how the product will meet a set of biz objectives” (paraphrased) http://j.mp/1bdkPuK #prodmgmt (permalink)