Amazon Kindle A Product Manager Perspective

Where does the Big Idea Come From ?

Stakeholders in the Big Idea Process

Customers insights Team Members are the

provide the seed of a technical program
product idea managers , engineers
Incremental ideas come and designers .
via feedback on social They frequently come
media or through some up with new product
other platforms Ides as well

They are product Executive leadership

managers or single are a good source of
threaded leaders. ideas. Many product
Responsible for meeting pivots originate
the needs of the Senior Management
customers review the roadmaps on
They gather the input a monthly or quarterly
and data and build up basis .
Idea into executable The y over see the
product execution of the ideas.
As a company what approach does Amazon Follow

Working Backwards
How Does The New Product Initiative Starts ?
 Product Initiative Process
Person X comes up with an
Idea . X will then either wait
for the semi-annual idea
challenge to showcase his
idea.
For a new product line, the
ideas fall under the
'business' category. After a
idea has been accepted by
the senior manager, a
working model is developed
and demonstrated to the 's-
team' and to the CEO Jeff
Bezos.
X will write a six page report
and upload that into one of the
three idea portals. These three
portals are Business, tech and
operations.
A working model is created
and if accepted by the
manager, it is implemented.
Amazon has a team, called the
ACES team, which scrutinizes
each idea to see how it can fit
into the companies business
model. If they don't accept X
can still 'appeal' it with senior
managers.
Tech and operation ideas are
then demonstrated to the
concerned senior manager (Vice
President capacity).
Writing An Internal Press Release The Amazon PM
Way
Heading Sub-Heading Summary
Name the product in a way Describe who the market for the Give a summary of the product and the
the reader (i.e. your target product is and what benefit they get. benefit. Assume the reader will not read
customers) will understand. One sentence only underneath the title. anything else so make this paragraph good.

Problem - Describe the HowtoGetStarted - Describe how QuotefromYou - A quote from a

problem your product solves. easy it is to get started spokesperson in your company.

HowtoGetStarted - CustomerQuote - Provide a quote ClosingandCalltoAction - Wrap

Describe how easy it is to get from a hypothetical customer that it up and give pointers where the
started. describes how they experienced the reader should go next.
benefit.

Are we building what is in the press release?

E-Readers
 Difference between e-readers &
tablets

Display Technology

Touchscreen
Technology
 1989: Ben 1999: Rocket
1993: Apple
1971: Project Bova eBook
Newton
Gutenberg publishes (portable
(PDA)
Cyberbooks reader)

2004: Sony 2000:

2002: 2002: Palm
Libr Microsoft
TabletPC Treo (PDA,
released in Reader
(technically then
Japan (1st (PC
since 1989) Smartphone)
gen eInk) software)

2006: Sony
11/2009:
Reader 12/2007: 12/2007:
Barnes &
released in Sony Amazon.com
Noble
U.S. releases v.2 releases the
releases the
(2nd gen of Reader Kindle
Nook
eInk)

2011: 2010: A 04/2010:

Amazon dozen+ new Apple
releases the eInk readers releases the
Kindle Fire released iPad
Evolution of kindle
 kindle First Gen kindle 2nd Gen

Launch : Nov 19, 2007 Launch : Feb10, 2009

Specs : 250 MB Specs : 2 GB
Price : $399 Price : $359 > $299 > 259$
kindle DX/ International kindle 2 International

Launch : May 6, 2009 Launch : Oct 7, 2009

Specs : Supports PDF/Bigger Scree Specs : International downloads
Price : $279 > $259 > $189
kindle 3rd Gen = Kindle 3 kindle 4th Gen = Kindle 4

Launch : Jul 28, 2010 Launch : Sep 28, 2011

Specs : 6 screen, Wi-Fi/3G Specs : 6 screen, Wi-fi/3G
Price : $139/$189 Price : $139/$189
 kindle Touch kindle 5

Launch : Sep 28, 2011 Launch : Sep 6, 2012

Price : 70$/$90
 6th Gen = kindle Paperwhite 1st and 2nd Gen

Launch : Oct 1, 2012 Launch : Sep 3, 2013

Specs : 4 GB Price : $120 /$210
Price : $120/$180
 7th Gen = kindle 7 and kindle Voyage

Launch : Oct 2, 2014 Launch : Oct 21, 2014

First Kindle in India Specs : 3 GB
Price : $200/$290
kindle Paperwhite 3rd Gen kindle Oasis 8th Gen

Launch : Apr 13, 2016

Launch : Jun 30, 2015 Price : $290/$380
 Is Amazon kindle a Success ?

+ %
0 >
>200%
1

: http://www.gadgetsnow.com/tech-news/Amazon-Kindle-sales-up-200-in-India/articleshow/51048120.cms
But Why not any other Tablet ?

E-ink Display
Google Plus A Product Manager Perspective
Googles Product Development
Cornerstones:

Build products Generate and Values built into

that people capitalize on products: dont
really want! network effects be evil

Proces Accept Ideas from anywhere

s: Prioritization into top 100

Small, agile engineering teams

User centered design

Self organization and visibility

1. Accept Ideas from Anywhere
Acknowledge: Great Have: Various forums and
ideas can come from mediums for idea-
anyone, anywhere collection

Six different
ideas per
hour on
average

Sometimes
Product discussion meeting
have
brainstorming session every
theme or
week
categories
for meetings
Googlers best
source of ideas,
Since engineers may be quiet at
intense users,
meetings, use collaborative
well-formed
workspaces and email for feedback
opinions
and ideas
2. Prioritization into Top 100
List all new ideas,
Anywhere time and
currently funded
resources are spent on
projects and ongoing
may be spent in future
maintenance efforts

Easy to see
Assign
priority if
attributes
two projects
and rank to
directly
each item
compared

Usefulness
Only 4s & 5s
for users,
get any
decrease
funding and
churn?,
staff to keep
chance of
or start
success

Does it diversify revenue

For each item, rank 1-5,
stream?, effort versus
based on quality and risk
impact
3. Small, Agile Engineering Teams
Each product has a co- Engineers work on one
located unit of 3, they product for 3-4 months,
have no departments then transition to next

Project Focus on
manager value to
works with user first,
9-10 people High-risk, then
across units high return monetize
projects
are called No such
Tech lead in
Googlettes thing as
unit
successful
responsible
failure if
for technical
usable, will
excellence
make $$
Large projects broken
Documentation is very
into logical modules,
sparse, evolves by f/b,
4units * 3persons =
only essentials in PRD
12persons
4. User Centered Design
Focus on quality, ask what
User studies, one per
does user really care
week
about?

Experiment:
Try out on
public site
and see how
users
respond

Experiment:
Do statistical Change as per users needs
analysis on
results of use
Better to get
good solution out
Iterations: Make product better over sooner, rather
time by feedback than best solution
5. Self Organization and Visibility
Sparrow
pages used
by employees

Launch
calendar and
time + status
of each
project

Snippets,
sent by every
employee on
Monday

By project,
Helps with re-use across
includes links to
projects, leveraging what is
employees
already being done
homepage
Failed Social Media Products from Google

Google Wave
Google Plus- Failure in Product Management
Ideation and Product Concept-

Vic Gundotra was the

person behind the idea Create a Social Network
of Google Plus or risk everything- were
the words of Vic to Larry
Known as Charismatic
and political-savvy who Thus the product was
eventually persuaded motivated from a
Larry Page in 2011 competitive standpoint
and not Customer
Standpoint

Facebook in 2011
had more than
300 million users
already and was
valued at $14b
 Product Development

Code Name- A dedicated secret More investment and

Emerald Sea building for Google more resources than
Plus with the CEO any other previous
relocated there project as per Vic
Timeline- 100 days A separate Caf- Sense of Something
to launch Cloud Set Apart
Change in Failed to Gain
Strategy for G+ confidence
Most Google product Vic could not gain
started small and grew confidence of his own
organically in scale and people. He focused on
importance but Google speed rather than
plus started big with strategy as per one of
team of 1000 engineers the employee
working on it
 Product Launch
Final Product was released on June 28, 2011 had several novel features which were not present in
Facebook at that time

Circles
Hangouts

Sparks
Huddle
 After Launch results and reasons of failure

Forced Integration with YouTube

Google didnt move into mobile fast
enough with Google Plus
Not a simple Social Media experience as
people had with Facebook and Linked In.
Resign of Vic from Google leading into
more uncertainty for the product
Now renamed Social Operations as-
Google Photos and Streams
 Product Lessons Learnt
Don't give paradoxes in communication
Not even Google can force feed the Internet
Dont sacrifice successful products
Always listen to customers
If they love it, set it free
Control the conversation about your product
Build around people problems, not company problems
Fast follow product strategy doesnt work with network effects
Dont try to be everything, all at once focus and de scope
Embrace the idea that life is messy
Thank You! Were open for
questions..