Are you a strategic thinker? Do you recognize and respect great digital products and aspire to build a great customer experience? Then you should consider becoming a digital product manager.
What is a Digital Product Manager?
Digital product managers are responsible for the development of digital products, from the start of the digital product development to launch. These include overseeing the entire life cycle of the digital product, developing technology, marketing, UI development, and ensuring that they create a great customer experience.
They also act as a liaison between the customers and technical teams. The customers’ needs and feedback are communicated to the technical team and translated to come up with a new and improved digital product.
How Much Does a Digital Product Manager Make?
According to Glassdoor, as of June 24, 2021, the average salary of a Digital Product Manager in the United States is $140,116 annually, which is pretty high compared to the average median wage for U.S. workers of $51,168 annually.
Responsibilities and Job Description of a Digital Product Manager
The responsibility and job description of a digital product manager differ from organization to organization. However, the main responsibility of almost all digital product managers is to spearhead the development of a digital product or website as they identify solutions, opportunities and grow the digital product.
Digital product managers also have a customer-first mindset and act as the voice of the customer or product user when decisions have to be made in developing a digital product. They translate the customers’ needs into business opportunities.
It is also important that they have an understanding of front-end and back-end programming languages so that they can develop, understand, and analyze data, to track and improve the digital product.
The responsibility of a digital product manager may include:
- Managing and overseeing the digital products, product roadmap, lead requirements, product development, user experience testing, and solution design.
- Working with the executive teams, product marketing, IT, and customers regularly to ensure the alignment of the digital product development and differentiation of the product from the competitors.
- Evaluating the performance of the digital product and ensuring constant improvements.
- Performing research user and buyer persona to understand their motivations and develop unique value propositions for both.
What Are The Essential Skills For Digital Product Managers?
Digital product managers need to have specific technical or hard skills and soft skills to create and manage successful digital products. These are the key skills they must possess and develop.
Product and Business Understanding
Knowing your products and business is an essential skill. You need to understand your digital products so that you can present the features and benefits accurately to the customers and persuade them to use the product. When you successfully convince the customer, they enthusiastically respond to your product and are happier to share your product with others.
Negotiation Skills
Half of the digital product manager’s job is negotiation. They negotiate with almost everyone every day to create win-win situations. Of course, their team and other parties may have some opposing interests regarding the expectations, product features, or timeline. But the role of a digital product manager is to negotiate and help both parties to generate creative options for solving the problem and reach an agreement.
Research and Analysis
Having outstanding research and analysis skills help you collect and analyze information to solve problems and make concrete decisions. Research and analysis is a way of gathering information about the customers, their needs, and market drivers. This also includes competitive analysis to gain insights into their current and future plans and create the best digital product.
Customer Service Skills
To become a successful digital product manager, you should be engaging with the customers on a regular basis making sure that your product meets their needs and expectations. Spending time with your customers or product users is vital to the role of a digital product manager. This is because you build relationships, emotional connections, and an intimate understanding of their needs to provide a product that will make a difference in their lives.
Collaboration Skills
Another critical skill in digital product management is collaboration skills. It is imperative in closing any loops and key in getting the best performance out of the development team. The most exciting part about working on a product is probably collaborating with the product users, stakeholders, and development team. Collaboration is a skill that you use when working with others to achieve a common goal.
User Experience (UX) Design
The user experience (UX) design answers the fundamental question, “what kind of experience will the user have when they interact with your digital product?”
Having a UX design skill allows you to visualize the product, its usability, and how it will fulfill the needs and expectations of the user.
Technology
This job title deals with digital products. Hence, you must understand the technology, especially the latest technology. Part of the job responsibility of a digital product manager is to be a liaison between the technical team and the end-user of the digital product. You can use your knowledge about the technology to translate and communicate information to people on both sides of the conversation, with technical and without technical knowledge.
Understanding the Code
Having the ability to code will give you an edge as a digital product manager. You will have a deeper understanding of the digital products you manage and allow you to involve a conversation with your software or IT team. It does not mean that you have to spend most of your time cracking out codes. You just need to understand these technologies, how they are used, and their capabilities. By comprehending the world of codes, you can speak the same language as your technical team and make recommendations.
A great place to start is learning the front-end programming languages, such as HTML and CSS or Javascript.
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