Product RoadmapvsMinimum Viable Product (MVP)

A product roadmap is a strategic document that communicates the WHY and WHAT of your product direction over time — not just a feature list. The best roadmaps are organized by outcomes (problems to solve), not outputs (features to ship). Research shows that outcome-driven roadmaps lead to 30-40% higher feature adoption rates because teams focus on customer impact rather than shipping for shipping's sake.

An MVP is the smallest version of your product that delivers real value to early users and generates validated learning. The goal isn't a 'crappy first version' — it's the fastest path to proving whether customers will pay for your solution. 74% of startups fail because they build something nobody wants.

The deadliest roadmap trap is treating it as a promise. 73% of product managers report that stakeholders treat the roadmap as a binding commitment, leading to 'feature factory' mode where teams ship on schedule but solve nothing. Another trap: roadmaps longer than 3 months become fiction — market conditions, customer feedback, and competitive moves invalidate long-term plans within weeks. LinkedIn found that 60% of roadmap items planned 6+ months out were either cancelled or fundamentally changed by the time their quarter arrived.

The trap is building too much. Founders spend 6-12 months building a 'complete' product before showing it to a single customer. By then, they've burned through runway and assumptions. Dropbox's MVP was a 3-minute demo video — it validated demand before writing a single line of code.

Build a Now/Next/Later roadmap: 'Now' (this sprint — committed, detailed), 'Next' (next 4-8 weeks — planned, flexible), 'Later' (3-6 months — directional themes only). For each item, state the problem being solved AND the success metric. Review and reprioritize the roadmap every 2 weeks. Limit 'Now' to 3 items maximum — if everything is a priority, nothing is.

Define the ONE core problem you solve. Build only the features needed to test if users will pay for that solution. Launch within 4-6 weeks. Your MVP should be embarrassingly simple — if you're not embarrassed by v1, you launched too late.