In a world where everything already exists, lemme tell you about CPD, Continuous Product Design. When you make a product, you aim to make your customers happy. But, sometimes they’re not excited about it. But you still want to make them happy, so you make updates. That’s it, but here’s the full version.
In the right term, continuous product design is an innovative approach that is centered around iterative improvements and user feedback on an ongoing product development’s lifecycle. So, it’s a cycle from the product released, people using it, people making reviews, and then the devs take the reviews for future updates.
This strategy is increasingly adopted by organizations seeking customer satisfaction while maintaining the same product in a competitive and rapidly changing market. That’s the key point, the same product but becoming better over time based on customers’ reviews.
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Let’s delve into the key principles while also comparing them with Discrete Product Design (DPD), kinda the opposite of CPD so that we can easily understand this. Here are the key principles.
No one uses “iterative”, right? So, let’s change it to repeated development. The product development process is broken down into smaller, more manageable segments or “sprints”. This principle allows the devs to quickly adapt to feedback and changes in real time.
This is the main difference between CPD and DPD. CPD products are updated regularly whether it’s fixing bugs, making new layouts, or new color schemes based on feedback. While DPD products are the final, finished version of the thing. When a new DPD product comes out, it’s gonna be a new product, not an update.
At the core of CPD, lies a relentless focus on the customer because the updates are based on the users’ reviews and feedback. Basically, the number one priority is to get as much engagement with customers through various stages of the product lifecycle to get better, meet, or even exceed the customers’ expectations.
On the other hand, Discrete Product Design is a secret product before release. No customer can give feedback or reviews. How the product is gonna be is what you’re gonna get, you don’t have a say and there won’t be any update.
For example, a car. Everything has been set, including the design, how many seats, city car or adventure car, manual or automatic, and things like that. Well, you can argue that you can modify the car to your liking, but that’s not an update. It’s not from the devs.
After the core, data is what keeps Continuous Product Design flowing. Just like we’ve established before, a CPD product will be updated based on data, such as consumer behavior, usage patterns, and market trends.
CPD’s data-driven approach enables informed decision-making for the devs to prioritize upcoming features, identify pain points, and optimize user experiences. In the cycle of monitoring and analyzing data, the devs can stay ahead of the curve and make proactive updates.
DPD devs also consider customer reviews for the future. The main difference is they will likely materialize those reviews and feedback to a new product, not as an update.
Here is the typical process of continued product design, although some particular products might need more steps or less.
Assessing the current product’s performance whilst gathering feedback. So, you need 2 things; the product and a platform to collect reviews. For example, a game. The game was released on Google Play, App Store, and Steam, which are also a place to collect reviews. Social media is also a good place to gather reviews.
Also known as agile and lean practices, acknowledging potential improvements and making a list of priorities based on user feedback. That way, a company can fulfill many requests efficiently.
After planning, create prototypes or updates. Here’s why you need this, there’s gonna be a lot of feedback and you want to fulfill them all. Well, you need to make a new thing to facilitate similar needs into one new feature. If it’s really new, you make prototypes. If there are similar cases before, you make updates accordingly.
Make the product or feature a reality. Just like the Reels feature from Instagram. It once was a prototype based on the rise of short vertical video format. Because Instagram was originally photo-only, they waited for this breakthrough to be accepted before making it permanent.
Your product has been changed, there is a new feature added. So, a new thing for people to review too. Conduct user testing to gather insights on the new implementation. Let them run wild to find the flaw from that feature, or to find that that’s flawless.
Analyze feedback and performance to make a new decision. Whether it’s gonna be a new update or a better version of the previous update. The cycle repeats for perpetual improvement and adaptation to the changing user needs and market conditions. Ensuring your product is always in the lead.
If you’re not already tempted by this approach, let’s find out the benefits. This methodology offers several significant benefits that can enhance the product’s quality and even your business performance.
At the core of it, CPD focuses on gathering feedback and incorporating them into the development process. This principle ensures that the product evolves to meet and even exceed user expectations.
By continuously refining the product based on real-world use, companies can improve and enhance the overall user experience. This leads to higher levels of customer satisfaction and even loyalty.
A faster improvement can be achieved by breaking down the development process into smaller, manageable increments. Additionally, the rapid updates allow companies to respond swiftly to market dynamics and stay ahead of competitors.
Adding new features or updates based on user feedback creates the impression that users are also heard. This interaction leads to better engagement, turning visitors into loyal customers and creating a positive perception of the brand.
Companies can catch design flaws before they become major problems by identifying issues early through prototyping and usability testing. CPD also affects prioritization based on feedback, preventing investment in low-value features. Ultimately, this process eliminates waste, further reducing costs and risks.
In the cycle of analyzing, planning, building, and releasing, the team gains insight into customer needs and behavior. This continuous learning environment helps the team become more proficient in their roles, ultimately leading to a faster and better product development team.
After knowing the benefits, let’s get to know the challenges and considerations that make continuous flow production design afloat.
Implementing CPD demands robust tools for data collection and analytics. That’s the essence of CPD. The challenge also requires you to consider the “Is the tool effective in supporting the iterative design process?” question.
Building a cross-functional team, including designers, developers, analysts, and other experts can be difficult. Ensuring them being on the same page, same lingo, or inside jokes is pretty challenging, considering their distant background. While communication and collaboration are crucial for CPD’s success.
Gathering feedback is essential, but this can be a time-consuming and structured approach to ensure that feedback is actionable and integrated into the design process. So, the right tool (an expandable tool) and capable personnel are essential for this to achieve success.
Continued production design requires the ability to adapt quickly to market trends. This can be challenging for an organization that needs multiple layers of agreement or is “not agile”.
Implementing and turning feedback into reality opens the possibility to completely shift a culture. Encouraging team members in a culture of experimentation, learning, and adaptation is essential for the continuous nature of the product.
Prioritizing resources and new features based on user feedback and market trends is another challenge. Ensuring that the right resources are allocated to the right development at the right time is a crucial point to consider.
Gaining perpetual success in updates and new features opens the possibility of larger teams or more complex products. Ensuring the process remains efficient and effective at scale is essential for long-term success.
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Knowing your understanding of CPD, we want to help you by recommending fonts for your projects. Interested? Take a look at the following font lists!
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Many examples of companies using this approach include Spotify, Amazon, Netflix, and Shopify. They’re all constantly introducing new features to elevate their brand. If you’re interested in making one yourself, let’s start with the brand identity.
To build your brand identity, the defining factors are the font and color palette. About the font, DM Letter Studio got you back with selected fonts that can make your brand distinguishable.
Along with the Continuous Production Design nature, these fonts are timeless and easily eye-catching without even trying. So if you’re searching for any fonts, look no further than visiting DM Letter Studio’s website. Let’s get the font before others steal the idea from you!
