How to make a Product Requirements Document (PRD)?
Product Requirements Document (PRD) is the initial document that describes the objective, features, functionality, and behavior of the product you’re building.
Duration
Complexity
Contributors
Product Manager
Getting Started
A Product Requirements Document (PRD) is very important for product managers as it establishes a track for the release. It also ensures that you fulfill customer requirements on time.
To start creating a PRD, you need to consider the four W’s:
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What do you want to build?
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Why do you want to build it?
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When do you need it?
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Who are your target users?
When?
PRD is typically created during the planning phase of product development before any actual development work begins.
Why?
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To plan out the product strategy, objectives, and scope.
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To assess the feasibility of the product idea and resources.
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To show how the product’s objectives will be achieved with the product.
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To help describe the product to all the stakeholders and bring them on the same page.
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To prevent project scope creep and random changes in project requirements.
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To answer what, why, and when of the product.
How to?
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Draft: Create a draft of the requirements based on the available information. The document should include:
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Objective
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Participants
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Requirements listed as User stories
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Target Personas
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Acceptance Criteria
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Timeline
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Exclusions
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Assumptions
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Dependencies
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Discuss and Detail: Discuss with participating team members and detail out the specifics like details of each user story, technical requirements, functional requirements, user flows or UI prototypes, etc.
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Review: Review the requirement with relevant stakeholders. Get approval, if necessary.
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Update: The PRD can be updated from time to time as more specifics get added.
Here's an example of PRD
Do’s & Don'ts
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Do’s |
Don’ts |
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Templates
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Product requirements template from Confluence
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PRD Template from Coda
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PRD from Notion Template Gallery
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PRD Template from Aha!
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Product requirements document (PRD) template from Mural
Suggested Tools
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GoogleDocs
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Jira
References
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Product requirements documents, downsized by Atlassian
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What is a PRD? | Product Requirements Document Explained by Dante & Itzel
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How to write a PRD (with examples)? by Product is Life
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How to write a lean PRD (product requirements document) for your next project in 5 steps from Planio
Other Related Best Practices
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User Stories