In business, it’s important to have a plan. A product development lifecycle (PDLC) is a plan for the creation and growth of a product. It outlines each step of the process, from conception to delivery and everything in between. The PDLC helps businesses keep track of their product’s progress and make sure they are on schedule for launch.
What Is Product Development Lifecycle?
PDLC stands for ‘Product Development Lifecycle’, and it is a comprehensive framework designed to guide product development offerings from conception to market.
PDLC outlines the sequence of activities – or milestones – that must be completed at each stage of the product’s evolution, including idea generation and evaluation, industrial design, manufacturing testing, market research, and launch.
All PDLC milestones must be systematically completed in order for the new product to reach its full potential. Even after launch, PDLC includes post-market activities such as customer feedback collection and software updates to ensure end-user satisfaction and maintain optimal functionality over time.
PDLC is an easy way for a product development team to map out all of its tasks making sure nothing gets left behind in any stage of development. By following PDLC every step of the way you can be sure that you are creating a quality product that can make even the toughest customer happy!
Why Is Product Development Life Cycle Important?
The product development life cycle is important because it provides a comprehensive plan for product delivery that helps to eliminate risks, reduce costs and ensure successful launch. It also provides a standardized list of activities that need to be completed throughout the product’s lifecycle, meaning nothing will get left behind in any stage.
By following the Product Development Lifecycle, businesses can ensure that their product is well-developed, tested and launched successfully. In this way, PDLC can help businesses save time and money while ensuring quality results.
Overall, PDLC helps ensure that product launches are successful and that customers are satisfied with their purchase. It also serves to streamline development processes and make sure everything runs smoothly.
The Seven Stages of Product Development Lifecycle
The product development life cycle includes seven main stages, which we will review in detail.
1. Idea Generation
One of the most important phases in product development life cycle (PDLC) is idea generation. This phase involves collecting and evaluating ideas, identifying the best solutions to address a user’s needs, and deciding which of these solutions should be taken forward.
The PDLC process typically starts with brainstorming – bringing together people from different fields, such as business, engineering, and design, to generate ideas for creating a software product or service. In addition to traditional brainstorming methods, teams may use mind mapping or other tools to help facilitate this process.
Once ideas have been generated and analyzed against certain criteria, a specific concept can be chosen for further development. Idea generation is an integral part of PDLC because it forms the groundwork for the entire product development process.
By properly identifying user requirements and prototyping possible solutions during this phase, teams can maximize their chances of success by ensuring their products meet customer expectations.
2. Validation
Idea validation is the second step in the Product Development Lifecycle. At this stage, you’re looking to get an idea validated before investing further time and money.
You’ll be looking to find out if your idea solves a specific problem or satisfies a particular need. You’ll also want to know if there’s an existing solution that already answers the same need. It is important to evaluate the risks and rewards of the concept, both in terms of cost and time needed for development.
The purpose of idea validation is to assess whether you have tested all elements thoroughly enough to remove as much risk as possible prior to investing in development.
Put simply, it is making sure that whatever you’re building has a real value and something people will actually buy or use. By carrying out sufficient research and testing at this stage, it will prevent you from spending unnecessary resources on ideas with little potential for success when launched into the public domain.
3. Proof of Concept
The Proof of Concept (POC) stage is the third step in the software product development lifecycle.
After idea generation and validation comes the proof of concept, or sometimes called the proof-of-concept phase. The purpose of this stage is to assess if an idea or prototype can be converted into a viable and successful product.
During this, as well as any other PDLC stage, teams should brainstorm ideas, explore new untested solutions and combinations that could possibly enhance their product’s functioning. By conducting tests early on which inform future actions, POC ensures efficiency during PDLC cycle.
During this phase, developers strive to come up with a realistic timeline for releasing the product and issues like cost risk assessment are addressed while evaluating success potentials and limitations of the underlying technology. A thorough comprehension of this phase helps developers analyze further phases and make informed decisions necessary to create high performing end products.
All in all, POC is necessary to help small businesses judge how feasible it would be to convert their ideas into working products on market since it offers them more control over all PDLC stages. However difficult as it may sound, properly executing this PDLC stage erases ambiguities regarding progress throughout PDLC cycle and eventually aids in delivering solutions that meet set expectations ideally suited for target markets and user needs.
4. Development
The fourth stage of the product development lifecycle (PDLC) is known as the Development stage. This stage takes your initial idea and turns it into a viable product or offering.
During this stage, you will use the insights gained from validation to build out features, determine pricing, and create a monetization strategy for the product or service you are developing. It’s important to iterate and refine during this phase to ensure that user needs are being adequately addressed in the finished product.
During development, teams must be mindful of existing resources – both hardware and software – as well as future system scalability requirements. Depending on project complexity, many PDLC teams work in agile sprints to ensure that all requirements can be met in a timely manner.
The results of this development process will determine how quickly and cost-effectively your PDLC team can move into launch preparation and production phases. With proper execution, PDLC teams are ready to bring their products or services to market in one cohesive packages when completing development.
5. Testing
After an idea is generated, validated, and developed, testing is the next important step in PDLC. By assessing the quality of the product being created before it leaves the project’s Sandbox, developers can fix any problems that arise beforehand.
This practice also helps to improve the end user’s experience as they’re more likely to be satisfied with a dependable product. Testing involves various verification activities including unit tests, system integration tests, and user acceptance tests.
The goal of this phase is to collaboratively find and fix any bugs discovered during testing on either side of PDLC process—functionality or non-functionality related. Once all bugs have been resolved, the product can be released for public use.
Without testing, products may contain many issues that could otherwise have been prevented resulting in undesirable effects such as loss of user trust and data security breaches.
Thus, thorough testing during PDLC is one of the most crucial steps to assess results of intense effort during prior stages and ensure successful completion of PDLC process.
6. Deployment and Maintenance
With the idea confirmed, the proof of concept validated, the development completed and thoroughly tested, it’s time to move on to deployment and maintenance in PDLC.
Deployment is all about releasing your product into customer hands, which can be done in a variety of ways depending on the digital age framework associated with your product. These steps can often include setting up hosting accounts, configuring delivery services such as CDNs (Content Delivery Networks) or other third parties, customer onboarding strategies, launch activities and communications strategies to name a few.
Maintenance is an ongoing process that involves patching or updating software versions typically driven by market or customer feedback as well as bug reports from beta tester or users. It’s also important to remain aware of applicable regulatory changes as this could affect how you use and store customer data.
In effect, maintaining products requires being attentive to customer needs at all times when launching new features or updates to existing products during PDLC cycles. That way, any changes implemented directly correspond with primary user needs & wants without drastically affecting the overall product usability & performance.
All these components must work together seamlessly in order for PDLC stages to successfully be executed efficiently & effectively. After implementing successful deployment & maintenance stages within PDLC processes you’ll have a perfected stable product that customers are engaged & adore perfectly laying foundation for your next PDLC cycle and evolution phase of your brand’s product experience journey!
So don’t forget to take advantage of every PDLC opportunity and masterfully bring ideas into fruition while providing user maximizing experiences!
7. Retirement
Retirement is the seventh and final stage of the PDLC process for software products. In every product’s life comes a moment when it becomes outdated and no longer represents the best solution for a customer’s needs.
That’s when it’s time to retire the product. Retirement does not mean deleting the product from existence, but rather transitioning its functionality and data to another version of it or archiving it for future. It marks the end of a product’s lifecycle and involves discontinuing support, halting maintenance activities and shutting down development efforts, so a business can move on to other projects or activities.
It is important to note that when a product enters retirement it still requires ongoing attention; businesses must consider how long they will provide security patches, bug fixes and technical support to maintain customer satisfaction levels. Retirement may also include activities like archiving information, deleting user data, revoking accesses and rights etc., typically with an aim of minimizing liabilities associated with software programs.
Clearly, retirement should be carefully planned as it provides an opportunity to close off all aspects of PDLC and maintain customer satisfaction in the process. After all, a business’s relationship with customers doesn’t end when a product goes into retirement—rather this is when their understanding about the product needs to be properly documented so expectations are met during renewal or transition efforts.
Ultimately, correctly managing the PDLC process until retirement is one sure way for businesses to ensure the success of their offerings in the market. All in all, though possibly overlooked at times, retirement is nonetheless an essential step of PDLC for software products – one that should not be taken lightly.
What Affects Product Life Cycle
There are a number of factors that can affect the length and success of a product’s life cycle. We will classify them under positively affecting and negatively affecting factors.
Positive factors
1. Market Demand or Customer Acceptance
If a product is in demand and customers love it, then its PDLC cycle can be extended. This means that businesses need to take into account customer feedback and preferences, as well as current trends in the market.
2. Product Design
For a product to be successful, it needs to have a great design. This includes functionality, usability and aesthetics. If the product is designed in a way that takes customer needs and preferences into account and looks good, it is more likely to be successful.
3. Quality of the Product
A product needs to be of a high quality in order to be successful. Quality includes reliability, durability, and performance as well as customer service that is provided with the product.
4. Price
The product’s pricing is also an important factor in PDLC. If the price of the product is too high, customers may not be willing to purchase it. On the other hand, if the price is too low, customers may think that the product is of low quality.
Negative factors
1. Competition
Increased competition from other products can reduce the sales and decrease the life cycle of a product. By keeping an eye on the competition, businesses can stay one step ahead and ensure their product is successful.
2. Consumer Preferences
If customer preferences change, then the product may no longer be in demand and its PDLC will be shorter. Businesses need to be aware of changing customer preferences and adapt accordingly.
3. Technology Changes
Rapid changes in technology can also reduce the life cycle of a product. This is especially true in IT-related products, where new software and hardware can be released that are more advanced or better suited for customer needs.
4. Economic Conditions
The economic conditions of the market can also affect the product life cycle, as customers may not be willing to buy the product if they cannot afford it. Businesses need to be aware of economic conditions and adjust their product offerings accordingly.
Tools for Product Development Life Cycle Management
There are a number of tools that can aid in product development lifecycle management. These tools can help businesses ensure that their PDLC process is successful and efficient, leading to better outcomes for their products.
The first tool a company should use is a detailed timeline that maps out each PDLC phase. This framework will help ensure that deadlines are met throughout the PDLC process.
Additionally, PDLC management tools should include methods for assessing quality at every step, so any issues can be addressed before they become major problems.
Document sharing is another important PDLC management tool—this helps eliminate miscommunication and errors, while ensuring all stakeholders remain actively engaged in product development.
Finally, using analytics software can help managers observe PDLC trends and make adjustments as needed for greater success.
By utilizing these essential PDLC management tools, organizations can ensure a smoother PDLC process from inception to finish.
Tips for Product Development Life Cycle Management
Product development lifecycle management can be a complex process, but there are several tips that can help businesses successfully manage their PDLC.
1. Start with the customer in mind—this means understanding customer needs and preferences, as well as staying aware of trends in the market. This will help ensure that your product is not only successful, but also meets customer expectations.
2. Set achievable deadlines—establishing realistic goals and meeting them will help keep the PDLC process on track.
3. Utilize effective communication tools—clear and timely communication between stakeholders is essential for a successful product development lifecycle.
4. Test thoroughly—testing your product thoroughly at every stage of PDLC will help eliminate any potential issues before they become major problems.
5. Be flexible—PDLC management should be a dynamic process, so businesses should remain open to change and adjust as needed.
By following these tips, businesses can ensure their product development life cycle is successful and efficient. This will lead to greater customer satisfaction and better product outcomes.
Managing a Portfolio of Products (at different stages of the PDLC)
For product managers looking to optimize the performance of their product portfolio, managing a mix of products at different stages of the PDLC is critical. PDLC management involves understanding not just the current stage a particular product is in, but also being able to anticipate and plan for any potential future changes in demand or customer requirements.
It’s important to have the right tools, processes, and skillsets in place to proactively manage and adjust products as they progress through their PDLC – from conception and validation through development and launch stages.
By maintaining an inventory of products at varying PDLC points, companies can stay ahead of consumer trends and gain a competitive edge. Doing so enables them to quickly respond with updated features or entirely new products that meet customers’ changing needs without having to invest considerable resources in product development or marketing efforts.
Ultimately PDLC management can be key in optimizing profitability from your product portfolio.
Product Development Life Cycle Example
Let’s review the product development lifecycle for an imaginary audio streaming company MediaStar that develops a surround-sound music streaming product.
The idea generation phase was kicked off by a team brainstorming session, during which they came up with a number of ideas for new products. They then worked to validate the most promising one, conducting user research and market analysis to see if there was demand for a surround-sound streaming product.
After proving that there was indeed demand, the team moved on to the proof of concept (POC) phase. This is where they created a prototype of the product and tested it with users to get feedback. Based on that feedback, they made changes and improvements to the product.
The development phase followed, during which the team built the actual product. They made sure that it met all of the requirements set out in the POC phase and that it was high quality.
The testing phase was next, and this is where the team tested the product with a wider group of users to get more feedback. Based on that feedback, they made more changes and improvements to the product.
The deployment and maintenance phase followed, during which the team released the product to the public and continued to maintain it by fixing bugs and releasing patches. They also engaged with customers to get feedback on how they liked the product and what could be improved.
Finally, comes the retirement phase. When a product reaches retirement, it doesn’t mean that it’s no longer used – it just means that it’s no longer being developed or updated. MediaStar will continue to support their surround-sound streaming product until it’s finally retired many years from now.
Conclusion
The seven stages of the product development lifecycle (PDLC) are important for businesses to remember as they go about creating and maintaining software products. Each stage provides an opportunity for a business to ensure customer satisfaction by considering their needs and wants.
PDLC management involves understanding the current stage of a product and anticipating any potential future changes in demand or customer requirements. By managing an inventory of products at varying PDLC points proactively, companies can stay ahead of consumer trends and gain a competitive edge.
So this wraps up our review of the product development lifecycle and how it can be managed for maximum profitability. Hopefully this information has been helpful to you! Good luck managing your product portfolio!
Elmar Mammadov is a software developer, tech startup founder, and computer science career specialist. He is the founder of CS Careerline and a true career changer who has previously pursued careers in medicine and neuroscience.
Due to his interest in programming and years of past personal experience in coding, he decided to break into the tech industry by attending a Master’s in Computer Science for career changers at University of Pennsylvania. Elmar passionately writes and coaches about breaking into the tech industry and computer science in general.