BlogWebsite & Technology Product Roadmap Evaluation Website & Technology Product Roadmap Evaluation Author: Tatiana Morand June 3, 2011 Contents 🕑 1 min read No software is ever perfect. If you ever find a piece of software that meets 100% of your needs, either you are a Zen Buddhist – or you have overlooked something! It is important that a product has a viable roadmap for ongoing development and improvement. Here are some questions you should answer for each software vendor (and again, do your own research, rather than rely on nice friendly sales people): How many times has the product been updated in the last 12 months? What specific updates have been released? Looking at them, do you see anything that is relevant and useful to you? How good has the vendor been in keeping promises, in terms of releasing new versions when they said they would? How transparent is the process by which the vendor determines what goes into new versions? How well does the vendor listen to feedback? Is there a dialog between the vendor and users? Is there a robust community of users (and participation from the vendor) where product enhancements are being discussed? Here’s a caveat: Never make a decision based on what is being promised. Wonderful product enhancements may be promised by persuasive sales people but you can NOT rely on them. Make sure that product, as it is today, will be good enough to meet your needs. Promised enhancements might come – or might not. And even if they come, they might be different from what you had envisioned or were promised. Related Website & Technology Articles Website & Technology 🕑 17 Min Read The 50 Best Nonprofit Websites To Get You Inspired Website & Technology 🕑 12 Min Read The Best Online Payment Service Providers in 2023 Website & Technology 🕑 8 Min Read Nonprofit Databases 101: How To Organize Your Supporter Relationships The Membership Growth Report: Benchmarks & Insights for Growing Revenue and Constituents Get the report now!