How to Apply Business Analysis During Product Life Cycle

Over the past few years, the role of Business Analyst has been emerging as a uniquely skilled individual, capable of playing many important roles. Business Analysis, and the role of a Business Analyst, dons a different meaning in different organizations. As the BA role continues to evolve, their role and involvement in the organization continue to expand.

A business analyst works in a multifaceted world. In order to meet all the business needs a business analyst has to act as a mediator, moderator, facilitator, connector, and ambassador. They are the bridge that fills in the gap between each department throughout every step of development.

A business analyst is a crucial player in identifying business requirements and converting them into a solution. They are the crucial link between business stakeholders and the development team to ensure everyone is on the same page with the business needs. Thus, they are perfectly positioned to communicate with all the stakeholders and build a common vision for a product. They elicit requirements, document & model requirements, verify & validate requirements, and communicate the requirements. BAs are involved in the design, implementation, testing, and deployment stages too.

A good business analyst understands the need of the organization. They help in boosting productivity and the execution of the product flawlessly.

Let us take a look at how business analysis is applied during the product life cycle.

Business analysis is applied throughout the product lifecycle. Effective analysis throughout each product lifecycle stage allows the team to ensure:

• To evolve the product, fast feedback is used
• Ongoing customer value is delivered

Business analysis practices should be applied at each product lifecycle stage:

Incubation 

• Identify and understand customer needs, gaps, and opportunities, using cost-effective customer-centric design approaches.
• Improve the quality of product ideas.
• Evolve the understanding of customers and the marketplace to solidify a strong product vision.

Build

• Develop a strong value proposition for customers.
• Target market segments with a suitable value proposition.
• Solidify implementation plans, using relevant strategies for market segments and product launch strategies.

Launch         

• Help fine-tune mechanisms to capture product metrics and customer feedback.
• Provide opportunities to tweak product features based on initial launch success.
• Manage organizational expectations based on the market introduction.
• Plan and devise additional tactics for product growth and market penetration based on initial results.

Maturity     

• Sustain the product by continuously adapting to changing customer expectations.
• Apply various strategies to improve, redesign, and optimize the overall customer experience to extend the product's life.
• Plan to revive the product for additional growth.
• Plan to retire the product.

Decline      

• Codify learnings and successes so they can be reused in future products.
• Implement plans to retire the product.
• Migrate customers to other products.
• Implement and test product growth strategies to identify the best ones.
• Plan and execute implementation tactics to achieve desired product goals, e.g., acceptance, adoption, or profitability goals.