Going by the intense competition in the market, it has become all the more vital for a product to perform better and have outstanding functionality and an enhanced usability experience.
Regardless of the industry or the target audience that a particular product caters to, each product today needs continuous up-gradation in terms of innovation, improvement and iterations with fast release cycles, be it a small mobile app or an enterprise level product like ERP. The trend is such that if you don’t do it, someone else will, hence it is imperative that one keeps fueling the innovative aspect of a product and keeps empowering it , especially so when it is at its optimum maturity level.
The need of the end-user is the very reason and drive behind the enhancement of any product. There always exists an unfulfilled customer need. This unfulfilled need acts like an opportunity for product improvisation and fuels the need for continuous business growth and evolution.
The product sustenance activities for any software product typically include maintenance releases, enhancements, bug fixing and new releases. In an overall product lifecycle, this phase is most crucial in terms of cost factor; sometimes even greater than the developmental cost itself.
In order to secure revenue streams from the existing product line, below are a few important factors that will help achieving product sustenance and also to win consistent loyalty from the existing customer base:
- Invest wisely: A well planned investment will help decide the time up to which the product can survive its maturity age
- Look for competitive advantage: Always add new features and modify the existing ones
- Listen to the customer: Have a dedicated customer support to solve the customer issues as fast as possible
- Keep pace with technology: Leverage the technological synergies to cut down on the cost and also to increase operational efficiencies
- Time to collaborate: Collaborate with related dependent products or merge with competitors
- Take small steps: Always reduce the span of release cycles by following agile methodologies
- Modify business model: Be open to altering the business model to survive competition
- Find a partner: Look for experts who can easily adapt and absorb product knowledge and can help in support activities, so that the product owner can easily concentrate on new development strategies and implementations
Product sustenance is very crucial within the product lifecycle, particularly when the product is close to its maturity stage or when it has already reached its maturity stage. This is the time when the stake holders have to take important decisions of fight or flight. Earlier the decision, lesser is the business loss.
