Companies find success when their products’ features solve their customers’ problems. To develop and define product features, you must first understand the problem that needs solving. Once you’ve identified the problem, you can then explore ways to provide a useful solution. Finally, you’ll work to find the best way to communicate that feature’s functionality to your customer.
Product features belong at the forefront of your business strategy. Developing features that solve customer needs will help you achieve your company’s business goals and strategic objectives.
What is a product feature?
A product feature refers to a characteristic of a product that offers value to customers. There are multiple features that give a product value, including design and functionality—all of which help a product stand out and satisfy potential customers.
Product feature vs. product benefit
While product features and product benefits are related—and both ladder up to customer satisfaction—they’re not the same thing. The former are specific, tangible attributes that add value or utility to the product. Product benefits, on the other hand, are what your customer gains from using the product. Understanding this key difference can help you communicate your product’s value to potential customers.
For example, let’s say you’re selling a portable audio recorder. In response to customer feedback, one of the new key features of the product is long battery life. If the battery life is the specific feature, the benefits describe the customer’s ability to use the product for a longer period of time without charging. Another benefit could be the end user’s ability to record longer audio clips. Again, the benefit reflects the customer experience of using the product, while the feature reflects something in the product itself.
Types of product features
Product features often fall into these categories:
Quality
A product’s quality can refer to both its durability and reputation. High-quality products function as intended. They may also be crafted with enduring materials. Earning a reputation as a high quality product is good for business, as it can build customer loyalty. Quality can also refer to the perceived value of a specific product; when something is known as high quality, many customers are willing to pay a higher price tag.
Aesthetics
The aesthetics of the product primarily include tactile and visual characteristics—aspects of the product designed to enhance a user’s interaction with the product, whether that is how it looks or how it feels during use. For example, a kitchen appliance that has an appealing minimalist design, or a pen that has a comfortable weight and shape.
Functionality
Functional features add utility and address a customer’s pain points. A product’s core functionalities allow it tomeet customer needs. A dress with pockets has functionality, for example, as does a blender with an assortment of interchangeable blades.
Example of a product feature
In 2015 Vicky Pasche founded the company Dapper Boi, a body inclusive and gender-neutral fashion brand. Vicky built the company around prioritizing product features meant to fulfill a customer need that not many companies addressed at the time.
Vicky says her product vision centered on functional pockets—a tangible feature—in her product offering because many customers were unhappy with clothing that had decorative pockets instead of deep, useful ones. In a clear way, she ensured her products’ features aligned with her customers’ needs.
“It shouldn’t be revolutionary to have functional pockets,” she says in an interview on Shopify Masters. With a simple feature add, the founder uncovered a way to offer a product that fixed that problem. Dapper Boi identified a customer need and decided to prioritize product features that would benefit the customers.
Next, the brand focused on other elements to ensure their customer needs were represented in their product features. Vicky saw that other companies were not offering sizes that fit a variety of body types, so she set out to develop a body-inclusive fashion company to meet a need for a wider selection of sizing.
A third product feature Dapper Boi offered was gender-neutral clothing. In more traditional fashion brands, items often are starkly gendered. Dapper Boi identified a potential market of customers who wanted access to non-gendered clothing. Prioritizing features that solved a customer need allowed the brand to fill a market gap.
How to develop product features
While there are several ways to develop product features, all of them require some basic product planning, including understanding your target audience, your current customer, your competitors, and the market you intend to enter. There are four broad steps you can take to create valuable product attributes:
1. Research the market
Market research involves identifying market trends and gleaning information on what your company can provide that no other company is offering. Conduct competitor analysis to identify market gaps. Once you’ve studied your competitors, compare product features and figure out how to differentiate your product offerings. What customer pain points are not currently being addressed? How can you align features with customer needs?
For example, if you sell sunhats and find that customers are unsatisfied with the quality of materials your competitor is using, a product feature you could develop is the use of sturdier, more durable materials. It’s especially important to identify your customers’ needs. Once you do that, you’ll develop these features into your product.
2. Understand customer needs
To develop product features, you need to understand what your customer wants. This can start with a single customer’s actions, like observing how they struggle with a specific part of an existing product. Next, perform user research, listen to user feedback, and conduct empathy interviews, which are in-depth, one-on-one interviews with a potential customer. From there, you can develop a user story. User stories help you understand what the user wants and needs to achieve with your product.
3. Design your product
Now that you’ve collected user data and studied the market, you can incorporate features into your product design that were previously absent. During the product design process, you’ll create and test prototypes and perform user testing before settling on a final version of the product. From there, you’ll work with your manufacturer to produce your product at scale.
4. Market your product
Once you’ve developed your product’s unique features, you’ll refine your marketing strategies to communicate how your product uniquely meets customer needs. Even if your product is very similar to another product, developing features that solve customer problems in new ways can help differentiate your product from others.
Product features FAQ
Is price a product feature?
Price is not a product feature, but finding the right price should be a key element in your product strategy. Calculating the right price requires some strategic thinking and will depend on product managers’ research. It’s important to understand your target audience, your competitors, and the perceived value of the product.
What is the difference between product features and requirements?
Product features and requirements are related but not the same thing. A product requirement is a technical capability that allows you to create a product feature. For example, an important product feature might be “intuitive buttons,” whereas a requirement would be “four clearly marked buttons that alert the user when the function is complete.” If you understand who your customer is and what they need, you can then identify what requirements are necessary to develop the key elements of a feature that ultimately will meet that customer need.
How do you prioritize product features on product roadmaps?
A product roadmap is the overall strategy for your product. It includes how your product will solve a customer problem and how you plan to communicate that. It also includes your product strategy, how the product may evolve with specific features, and how the development team and product fits into your overarching business strategy.
