Title: Automated Indices Pod - 2022 Product Roadmap & Strategy Framework
Author: @seb
Reviewed: @afromac
Created: 4 January 2022
Simple Summary
To create successful products that our customers love, Index Coop will need to develop a 2022 product roadmap that takes into account customer demand and market considerations. The first step in this exercise consists of creating a flexible framework that allows us to have a holistic view of the investment opportunities across crypto. This post seeks to formulate a framework that will guide the Automated Indices Pod (AIP) towards creating a clear product strategy and product roadmap for 2022.
Abstract
We have adopted a first-principles approach to understanding the crypto investment ecosystem. As a first step, we started with a blank slate and insourced a wide set of product ideas across the Coop with a focus on understanding existing DeFi protocols. Next, we identified common themes across a large set of product ideas. We are now in the process of validating key assumptions and stacking them against each other in terms of market opportunity and difficulty in launching. The approach can be summarized in four phases:
- Idea Consolidation - Index Coop wide product brainstorming workshop
- Initial Research - group ideas into themes and identify key metrics
- Validate Key Assumptions - deep dive into the most attractive segments and validate key assumptions
- Product Roadmap and Prioritization - stack different product ideas against each other for prioritization and roadmapping
Motivation
While our existing methodology to prioritize product ideas has been successful in evaluating external methodologies a more robust approach is required to create a cohesive product strategy that takes into account all investment opportunities in crypto.
Specification
Phase 1: Idea Consolidation
- As a first step, AIP held a series of brainstorming workshops to consolidate all potential products we could build
- Although we have finalized these workshops further ideas may be added as ad hoc items and recurring quarterly workshops may be a valuable exercise to assure we are in touch with the market
Phase 2: Initial Research
- After consolidating a sufficiently long list of product ideas, we grouped them into themes and product classes in order to determine the market opportunities in each segment
- The goal of this phase is to conduct initial research ahead of conducting a deep dive to validate key assumptions
- Initial research on each segment may include identifying TAM, Competition, Problem / Solution
- Progress of research will be tracked here
Phase 3: Validate Key Assumptions
- Once a high-level view of each segment is identified a Product Manager is assigned to the most promising product ideas and conducts a deep dive to validate key assumptions across the subset of the criteria in the below matrix
- Depending on the product idea more advanced product validation exercises may be required including customer interviews and surveys
Evaluation Criteria
| Criteria | Description |
|---|---|
| Trading Strategy Traction | TVL, average trading volume, APR |
| Target Market Size | Does the product cater to a large market from a potential AUM standpoint? Is it large now or in future? Stable or high growth? |
| Problem or Need | Is the problem / need real? Is this a fad or short term trend? Is there a sustainable pain, challenge, need? |
| Solution | Is the proposed solution Better, Faster, Cheaper? Brand? Quality? Efficient? Convenient? Unique? Value Prop? |
| Methodologist | Industry knowledge, unique skills, leadership, key relationships, prior successes and/or failures |
| Branding Partner | Is there a branding partner identified? # of Twitter followers, # of Discord followers, # of Youtube followers |
| Competition vs. Competitive Advantages | Direct vs. indirect? Barriers to entry? Differentiation? Simpler alternative exists? Future obsolescence? Unfair or sustainable advantage? |
| Product Economics | Cost of maintaining a product? On Ethereum mainnet? Cost & Time to Maintain Customer / Operations? NAV decay |
| Liquidity Considerations | Is there liquidity for the desired tokens? |
| Technical Integration - IC | What is the level of technical implementation required from IC? |
| Technical Integration - Set | What is the level of technical implementation required from SET? |
Phase 4: Product Roadmap and Prioritization
- Once the Product Manager gathers sufficient validation metrics they will showcase their findings to the broader AIP
- AIP will provide feedback ahead of a possible forum post and force rank the product vs others in the pipeline using the above Modified WTA matrix
Next Steps
- Currently, we are in the process of completing Phase 3 of this exercise and beginning to consolidate data points across the aforementioned evaluation criteria
- While this framework aids in creating a process around how to identify the next products to build, a more robust prioritization playbook will be required to scale this exercise
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