Unlock 2025 Benchmark data → Access insights to stay ahead in the digital experience race.

Get the Report
skip to content
Loading...
    • Why Product Analytics And what can it do for you?
    • How Heap Works A video guide
    • How Heap Compares Heap vs. competitors
    • Product Analytics + Digital Experience Analytics A deeper dive
    • The Future of Insights A comic book guide
    Watch a Demo
  • Data Insights

    • Journeys Visual maps of all user flows
    • Sense AI Analytics for everyone
    • Web Analytics Integrate key web metrics
    • Session Replay Complete context with a single click
    • Heatmaps Visualize user behavior instantly
    • Heap Illuminate Data science that pinpoints unknown friction

    Data Analysis

    • Segments User cohorts for actionable insights
    • Dashboards Share insights on critical metrics
    • Charts Analyze everything about your users
    • Playbooks Plug-and-play templates and analyses

    Data Foundation

    • Capture Automatic event tracking and apis
    • Mobile Track and analyze your users across devices
    • Enrichment Add context to your data
    • Integrations Connect bi-directionally to other tools

    Data Management

    • Governance Keep data clean and trusted
    • Security & Privacy Security and compliance made simple
    • Infrastructure How we build for scale
    • Heap Connect Send Heap data directly to your warehouse
  • Solutions

    • Funnel Optimization Improve conversion in user flows
    • Product Adoption Maximize adoption across your site
    • User Behavior Understand what your users do
    • Product Led Growth Manage PLG with data

    Industries

    • SaaS Easily improve acquisition, retention, and expansion
    • Retail and eComm Increase purchases and order value
    • Healthcare Build better digital patient experiences
    • Financial Services Raise share of wallet and LTV

    Heap For Teams

    • Product Teams Optimize product activation, conversion and retention
    • Marketing Teams Optimize acquisition performance and costs
    • Data Teams Optimize behavioral data without code
  • Pricing
  • Support

    • Heap University Video Tutorials
    • Help Center How to use Heap
    • Heap Plays Tactical how-to guides
    • Professional Services

    Resources

    • Down the Funnel Our complete blog and content library
    • Webinars & Events Events and webinar recordings
    • Press News from and about Heap
    • Careers Join us

    Ecosystem

    • Customer Community Join the conversation
    • Partners Technology and Solutions Partners
    • Developers
    • Customers Stories from over 9,000 successful companies
  • Free TrialRequest Demo
  • Log In
  • Free Trial
  • Request Demo
  • Log In

All Blogs

Want to craft a winning product strategy? You need quality data insights.

Mona Popli
July 18, 20233 min read
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn

This blog is based on our recent webinar featuring Melissa Perri, CEO of Product Institute, and Mona Popli, VP of Product Marketing at Heap.

Watch the webinar now on-demand to discover how companies like Doc Helper and Netflix turned their product strategies around by leveraging data.

Watch Now

Crafting an unbeatable product strategy is no walk in the park.

In the race to make an impact, many product teams fall prey to prioritizing quantity over quality. Unfortunately, this approach leads to stretched resources, team burnout, and compromised value.

So, what makes a product strategy shine?

According to Melissa Perri, CEO of Product Institute, the answer lies in the data. By utilizing the right data, you gain valuable insights into what's working well, what isn't, and what to prioritize.

The build trap 

When companies hit the fast track to growth, it's all sunshine and rainbows on the product side. But what if that trajectory takes an unexpected nosedive?

For many, the knee-jerk reaction is to churn out every new feature requested by their customer base. After all, what better way to grow your business than by delivering exactly what your customers ask for?

Here's where the problem lies. It’s the dreaded "build trap," as Melissa puts it. The build trap is the cycle teams fall into, where they create an overload of unnecessary and often meaningless features. It's all about building for the sake of building. It’s when teams focus on the quantity of what's produced, rather than the outcomes of the features and products themselves.

The result?

  1. Too many features and functions that nobody knows how to use

  2. Burnt-out teams juggling too many initiatives at once

  3. Unhappy customers who feel let down by the level of value provided

In our recent webinar, Melissa outlines how to steer clear of the dreaded build trap. We’ve captured some of her thoughts here.

The power of product strategy

A product strategy is not a wish list of features. It's a decision-making framework that drives action and aligns with your organization's goals. 

In the webinar, Melissa Perri lays out an ideal multi-layered product strategy:

  1. Start with the Company Vision: Begin by understanding the company's long-term goals set by the CEO and senior leadership.

  2. Identify Strategic Intents: Determine the business challenges that stand in the way of your company's vision. This should involve input from the entire C-suite.

  3. Establish Combined Goals: Collaboratively set goals for the entire organization, not just department or team-level goals. This helps ensure alignment on your strategic intents.

  4. Define Product Initiatives: Analyze the product vision to identify what problems your product can address. Prioritize opportunities that deliver the most value for your customers. 

  5. Explore Options: Consider various ways to solve the identified problems, evaluating different solutions and approaches.

  6. Gather Data: Obtain relevant data, including customer acquisition costs, churn rates, growth rates, ARR, and product costs, to set strategic intents and prioritize goals.

  7. Set Time-Bound Objectives: Time-bound objectives, usually spanning two to three years, focus the entire organization's efforts on specific priorities.

  8. Utilize Customer Insights: Leverage qualitative insights from customers to inform the development of features and address their needs effectively.

By following this approach you can build the most effective product strategy that drives the most impact.

The role of data

Data insights are the backbone of value and growth. They unveil the mysteries of customer behavior, solve problems, and fuel unparalleled growth.

“Beware of the trap of going into a planning session where everybody makes a roadmap without bringing any data to the table.” 

- Melissa Perri, CEO of Product Institute

Watch Now

As Melissa explains, if you want to craft an impactful product strategy, you need to strike a balance between early assessment and meaningful results. While it's essential to track relevant metrics right away, some changes need more time before they can be considered effective. Set time-bound metrics and consistently monitor progress.

To effectively track success, consider adopting the following metrics and frameworks:

  • OKRs: Align your goals and track progress by defining clear objectives and measurable key results.

  • Customer-centric metrics: Focus on metrics that directly relate to satisfaction and success. These include retention, engagement, and Net Promoter Score (NPS).

  • Product-specific metrics: Assess the performance and impact of your product with metrics like usage, conversion rate, and revenue generated.

  • Leading and lagging indicators: Evaluate the effectiveness of your strategy by combining leading indicators (e.g., adoption rates, usage patterns) and lagging indicators (e.g., revenue, retention).

  • Experimentation and A/B testing: Conduct controlled experiments to test new features or changes. This allows you to measure impact on desired outcomes.

Conclusion 

As Melissa explains, creating a winning product strategy requires a strong product culture and informed decision-making. Steer clear of the build trap, prioritize quality over quantity, and watch as your organization's product culture flourishes. These strategic moves will propel your products to triumphant success in the ever-evolving market landscape.

Mona Popli, VP of Product Marketing at Heap

Was this helpful?
PreviousNext

Related Stories

See All

  • Creative visualization of AI CoPilot capability
    article

    Heap announces new generative AI CoPilot

    Heap, the leader in product analytics, unveils AI CoPilot’s open beta today.

  • Heap.io
    article

    What’s Next in Experience Analytics?

    What does the future of analytics hold, and what does it mean for you?

  • Heap.io
    article

    Building a Retention Strategy, Part 2: Connecting Activities to Revenue with a Metrics Tree

    If you read one post from this series, it should be this one.

Better insights. Faster.

Request Demo
  • Platform
  • Capture
  • Enrichment
  • Integrations
  • Governance
  • Security & Privacy
  • Infrastructure
  • Heap Illuminate
  • Segments
  • Charts
  • Dashboards
  • Playbooks
  • Use Cases
  • Funnel Optimization
  • Product Adoption
  • User Behavior
  • Product Led Growth
  • Customer 360
  • SaaS
  • Retail and eComm
  • Financial Services
  • Why Heap
  • Why Product Analytics
  • How Heap Works
  • How Heap Compares
  • ROI Calculator
  • The Future of Insights
  • Resources
  • Blog
  • Content Library
  • Events
  • Topics
  • Heap University
  • Community
  • Professional Services
  • Company
  • About
  • Partners
  • Press
  • Careers
  • Customers
  • DEI
  • Support
  • Request Demo
  • Help Center
  • Contact Us
  • Pricing
  • Social
    • Twitter
    • Facebook
    • LinkedIn
    • YouTube

© 2025 Heap Inc. All Rights Reserved.

  • Legal
  • Privacy Policy
  • Status
  • Trust