New Coke: A Product Manager Campfire Story

In the world of product managers there are a few stories that the old hands talk about when they get together. The product failures, the flubs, and the downright fiascos that have grown into legends that are now only mentioned in hushed tones when a  product manger is trying to kill a product idea that … Read more

Performance Based Pricing – Is It Right For Product Managers In Tough Times?

Not to get too doom and gloom on you or anything, but how is your product doing these days? Sales a bit down? Sales fallen off a cliff? Desperate times call for desperate measures and I’m willing to bet that you are starting to get some pressure from upstairs / sales to start slashing your … Read more

What Product Managers Can Learn From The Tropicana Mistake

In the world of product mangers, there are some events that are only spoken about in hushed tones. Examples of product manager decisions that, when seen in the rear view mirror of time, just seem so very, very wrong that you wonder why the decision was ever made. Up until now the poster product for … Read more

Just For You: The Accidental Product Manager Newsletter

It is with a great deal of pride that I am finally able to announce that free subscriptions to The Accidental Product Manager Newsletter are now available! Subscribe to The Accidental Product Manager Newsletter now: Click Here! Why A Newsletter? Why Now? You might be asking why I felt the need to create a newsletter … Read more

Green Product Mangers Have Green Bosses

With “going green” being all the rage right now, product managers should give it some serious consideration for their products. Although we all SHOULD want to make the planet a better place for current and future generations to live, from a practical product management point of view having a green product may reduce costs and … Read more

When Times Are Bad – Product Managers Get Noticed!

The economy dips even farther down each and every day if you are to believe what you read on the front page of just about every paper lately. Product Mangers are finding themselves in tighter and tighter situations – what can we do in these tough times to make our products successful. Would you believe … Read more

How Product Managers Can Deal With Product Name Changes

Just image this scenario: you’re sitting there at “mid-sized company, Inc.” when one day your boss walks up to you and says “we’ve just been bought by really-big-company, Inc.” Ok, you say to yourself, how much of a big deal to my successful product can this be? Well one thing that you may not have … Read more

Web 2.0 Rules: Sell, Sell, Sell (Or Not)!

Come on, ‘fess up -  you have just a little bit of a salesperson living inside of you. On those occasions that you get in front of a customer, you can hardly help yourself from launching into a “sales mode” and trying to convince the customer that they need your product. Now that the Web … Read more

Why Chatty Product Managers Do Well On The Web 2.0

Boy, oh boy do I have a story for you today. I’ve been working with one of my customers who has decided that they need to improve how they communicate with their customers. Having read all of the industry rags, they’ve decided that they need to set up a social networking site for their company … Read more