{"id":82749,"date":"2024-09-03T16:07:21","date_gmt":"2024-09-03T15:07:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.prodpad.com\/?post_type=pp_glossary&p=82749"},"modified":"2024-09-03T16:09:20","modified_gmt":"2024-09-03T15:09:20","slug":"opportunity-scoring","status":"publish","type":"pp_glossary","link":"https:\/\/www.prodpad.com\/glossary\/opportunity-scoring\/","title":{"rendered":"Opportunity Scoring"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\n
\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n

What is opportunity scoring?\u00a0<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Opportunity scoring is a prioritization model<\/a> that helps PMs identify which product ideas they should focus development on. It\u2019s a model that dives deeper into customer feedback to find out what features users believe are important, and what features they feel underserved by. It then collates these criteria to generate an easy-to-understand score.\u00a0

As a Product Manager, you\u2019re constantly making choices. Shall you work on this <\/em>idea over here, or that <\/em>feature <\/em>idea <\/em>over there? By using opportunity scoring, you give yourself more data from which to make informed decisions and ensure you\u2019re working on what offers the most value to your customers.\u00a0

Your product has multiple different features that your customers can use right? Depending on their preferences, industry, or customer segment, they\u2019re going to find some features wayyy more important than others. The process of opportunity scoring will help you discover the preferences and priorities your customers have.

Through gathering customer feedback for opportunity scoring, you\u2019ll start to learn the features your customers can\u2019t live without. Granted this is something that your adoption rate<\/a> can help you find, too, but this prioritization model goes further. In addition, you\u2019ll also learn how satisfied your customers are with your features. This allows you to see if there\u2019s anything that your customers don\u2019t like, or think isn\u2019t good enough.\u00a0

Opportunity scoring combines both these metrics – adoption\/usage and satisfaction –\u00a0 meaning that you\u2019ll be able to easily see if you have features that are important but not very good in the eyes of your customers. This can steer you towards what you should work on next, as features with a high opportunity score represent a big, well, opportunity<\/em> if you fix them and make them better.

Think about it like this. If you\u2019re going to use time and resources to further develop a feature, it\u2019s best that it\u2019s a feature that users care about. It\u2019s a waste of time working on a feature users have little interest in, or on a feature that they think is already doing the job well. Opportunity scoring helps you dig out these high-opportunity gems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Who invented opportunity scoring?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Opportunity scoring is the brainchild of Tony Ulwick, invented in the 1990s alongside the other core components of the outcome-driven innovation framework (ODI)<\/a>. Ulwick believed that traditional methods of prioritization were missing the mark on understanding what customers wanted, so invented this model to cut through the noise and hone in on what really mattered.\u00a0

That\u2019s the reason why this approach is so customer-centric, using feedback to learn what they\u2019re trying to achieve instead <\/strong>of what they thought they needed to achieve it. Customers can struggle to articulate feature needs, but outcomes are a lot easier for them to envision and share.\u00a0

Opportunity scoring eliminates the guesswork of feature prioritization. By focusing on the outcomes that matter most to customers, opportunity scoring helps product teams zero in on the features that will have the greatest impact. It\u2019s like having a cheat code for delivering exactly what your users want – often before they even know they want it.\u00a0

Originally designed for businesses to identify product and service opportunities, this model has been successfully adopted by Product Managers to determine what product idea is right to prioritize on their product roadmap<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What are the benefits of opportunity scoring?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Opportunity scoring is a worthwhile prioritization model to add to your toolkit. If you\u2019re struggling to determine the best next steps for your product, it guides you towards the right ideas.\u00a0

Some of the key benefits of opportunity scoring include:\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simplicity and accessibility<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Even if math isn\u2019t your strong suit, working out an opportunity score is pretty simple to understand and implement. Providing that you can add and subtract, it\u2019s an accessible tool that doesn\u2019t require too much brainpower for Product Managers to generate.\u00a0

This means that you can access data easily to influence key decision-making.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Data-driven prioritization<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

With opportunity scoring, you\u2019re not going off assumptions, instead, you\u2019re using genuine data and insight to inform your prioritization. Opportunity scoring involves getting opinions directly from your customers, so it allows you to tap into their thoughts, eliminating any guesswork.\u00a0

With opportunity scoring, you\u2019re getting quantitative data, helping you to effectively visualize something that is typically subjective and turn it into an objective resource.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Customer-centric focus<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

This method zeroes in on what matters most to your customers by assessing their satisfaction with current solutions. A by-product of this is that it can help you improve your overall customer experience. By knowing key areas that need improvement and by using opportunity scoring to address them, you\u2019re building a better product for your customers, helping them to see the value in your product.\u00a0

Over time, this can reduce your Time to Value<\/a> and improve your customer acquisition. Greater satisfaction will also lead to less customer churn<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Better team alignment<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Like many other prioritization models, opportunity scoring helps you organize your team, ensuring that everyone is on the same page about what features you\u2019re working on and why. This data helps boost collaboration and transparency within your product team structure<\/a>, reducing internal conflicts and issues.\u00a0

As a Product Manager, when you make team decisions, you want to equip yourself with evidence to prove why you\u2019re doing something over the other. Opportunity scoring gives you that evidence so that you and your team can confidently work towards the same goals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Are there any drawbacks to Opportunity Scoring?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

There are a few things you need to consider before embracing opportunity scoring with open arms. Yes, it can help you prioritize features, but there are a few issues with it that if ignored can mess you up.\u00a0

Here are a few of the main drawbacks that you need to have in mind to stop you from making any mistakes with this method.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reliance on accurate data<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Opportunity scoring is only as good as the data you put into it. For it to work effectively, you need to make sure that the quality of your customer feedback is at a good standard. If there\u2019s bias, or if the results are incomplete or improperly gathered, you can end up with scores that are misguided and that may not truly reflect the wants and needs of your customers.

To help ensure that you get hold of accurate data, you should train your customer teams to get really useful feedback<\/a>. We\u2019ve got a really helpful slide deck to help you do that. You can download it below \ud83d\udd3d.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n

\n

Feedback Training for Customer-facing Teams Slide Deck<\/p>\n <\/div>\n

\n <\/span>\n <\/div>\n<\/a>\n\n\n\n\n

Overemphasis on existing needs<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

One thing to be aware of is that opportunity scoring only focuses on improving existing features. Focusing on what you already have can limit innovation and box you into making incremental improvements instead of breakthrough changes that could set your product apart in the market. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Resource-intensive process<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Collecting and analyzing the necessary data for opportunity scoring can be time-consuming and complex, especially for larger organizations or products with numerous features. This process requires significant effort to execute effectively and needs to be coordinated well.\u00a0

If you haven\u2019t got the time or resources to focus on opportunity scoring, you may want to use other prioritization methods that look at data and customer trends that you already have. There\u2019s a ton of frameworks you can use. Check out our complete eBook that highlights 17 of the best prioritization frameworks.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"The<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

How do you work out your opportunity score? <\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Finding the opportunity score of your features is simple once you have gathered the right information. All you need to do is plug some statistics into a formula. However, it can take a bit of effort to get those statistics.\u00a0

See, before you can do anything, you need to get an average importance and satisfaction score from your customers. Your best bet to do this is through a customer survey, questionnaire, or even interviews. To get a more accurate reading, you also want to make sure that you get replies from customers that best reflect your entire user base. This is why you may want to utilize your Customer Advisory Board<\/a> to get answers from customers you trust who also reflect a nice share of your audience.\u00a0

To get your importance and satisfaction scores, you need to ask your customers to provide a rating out of 10. Now remember, opportunity scoring is all about customer outcomes, so you\u2019re going to want to focus on outcomes that reflect the needs, pain points, and desires of your target customers.\u00a0

Once you\u2019ve gotten your feedback in, you\u2019ll then be able to work out the average importance and satisfaction score for each outcome you’ve asked about. From here, you can pop the numbers into the formula below to get your results:

Opportunity Score = Importance + max\u2061(Importance\u2212Satisfaction,0)<\/strong>

Hold on. What\u2019s with the zero? Who\u2019s Max? Confused? Let\u2019s break it down.\u00a0

When working out an opportunity score, you only want to concern yourself with the results where satisfaction is lower than the importance. That makes sense, because if there is a high satisfaction, well then it means that it\u2019s not really an opportunity.\u00a0

All that max<\/em> and 0 <\/em>do in the formula is make sure that you can\u2019t run the formula if importance minus satisfaction equals a value below 0, which would happen if satisfaction is higher than importance. So, with that caveat out the way, we can just go and remove these extra details to create a much nicer, less intimidating formula of:\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"opportunity<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Awesome. Let\u2019s plug some numbers in as an example to see the formula in action. Let’s say a specific outcome got an average importance score of 7 and a satisfaction score of 4. Popping those in gives you:

Opportunity score = 7 + (7-4)<\/strong>

If you remember your order of sums from school, you\u2019ll know that you need to work out the equation in the brackets first, giving you:

7 + 3<\/strong>

That equals 10. This is your opportunity score for that specific outcome. From there you can then go through all the different outcomes you asked your customers about and then compare your results to find where the best opportunity lies. Once you know which one has the highest score, you can then focus on creating features that help users achieve those outcomes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What are the best practices for using opportunity scoring?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re excited by the prospect of using opportunity scoring, you need to make sure that you do things right. To help you gather the best insights from your customers so that you can build accurate scores, follow these opportunity-scoring best practices and tips. <\/p>\n\n\n\n