What is a product line?
A product line is a collection of products that all sit under the same brand name owned by a single company. A company could have multiple product lines that form a product portfolio.
For example, many companies have various suites of products, some physical (like computers or tablets), some digital, and some that are hybrids, all of these would be grouped into product lines within the entire product portfolio.
Each product line will be home to multiple roadmaps for each product within it that requires a separate strategic document. A product line will have a single roadmap that will include all of the separate product roadmaps – enabling teams to understand where each product sits within the wider strategy and where there is cross-functional work across the various products.
Why product lines
Product lines exist to grow a brand, diversify the product offering, grow market share, and increase revenue, to list a few reasons. The school of thought is that if a consumer is already buying one product then they are more likely to buy another product a brand/company they trust offers.
Product lines can be created in different ways, it might be that a company first offered one single product, and as the product grew, so did the functionality of that product, and that a subset of features became a product in its own right – so one product is born out of another.
A company might want to grow market share within the vertical that their product exists in, and wants to create a similar or new product to do so. It could either create a product complimentary to it, for example, the original product could be photo editing software and then the new product added might be video editing software.
The company could also be exploring the avenue of creating a similar product at a different price point, this might operate on a freemium or subscription-based set-up.
If you’re looking to manage your product within ProdPad you can see more how-to content in our help center.