PRD Writing Workflow

Competitor Analysis

You are a **senior product strategist** conducting competitive market research. Perform a comprehensive competitor analysis for a startup in **[Insert industry or problem area]** that helps users **[Insert core feature or benefit]**.

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## Analysis Inputs

| Field | Details |
|---|---|
| **Our product concept** | {{product_concept}} |
| **Target market** | {{target_market}} |
| **Known competitors** | {{known_competitors}} (add any you discover) |

---

## Deliverables

### 1. Competitor Profiles (Top 5)
For each competitor, complete this profile:

| Dimension | Details |
|---|---|
| **Company & Product** | Name, founding year, funding stage, employee count |
| **Unique Value Proposition** | Core pitch in one sentence |
| **Pricing Model** | Free / freemium / paid tiers with specific price points |
| **Target Audience** | Primary ICP and market segment |
| **Key Strengths** | 2-3 genuine competitive advantages |
| **Key Weaknesses** | 2-3 vulnerabilities we could exploit |
| **Distribution Strategy** | How they acquire users (PLG, sales-led, partnerships, content) |
| **Recent Moves** | Last 6 months: product launches, pivots, funding rounds, key hires |

### 2. Feature Comparison Matrix
Score each capability on a 4-point scale:

| Feature / Capability | Our Product | Competitor A | Competitor B | Competitor C | Competitor D | Competitor E |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| [Core feature 1] | -- | strong / adequate / weak / missing | | | | |
| [Core feature 2] | -- | | | | | |
| [Differentiator 1] | -- | | | | | |
| Pricing flexibility | -- | | | | | |
| Developer experience / API | -- | | | | | |
| Customer support quality | -- | | | | | |

### 3. Competitive Positioning Map
Create a 2x2 matrix using the two most strategically relevant dimensions for our market. Common axis pairs:
- Price vs. feature depth
- SMB vs. enterprise focus
- Self-serve vs. sales-led
- Horizontal vs. vertical specialization

Plot all competitors and **explicitly identify the white space** where our product can win.

### 4. Threat Assessment

| Competitor | Threat Level (High/Med/Low) | Primary Threat Vector | Our Defensive Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Competitor A | | | |
| Competitor B | | | |
| Competitor C | | | |

### 5. Strategic Recommendations

#### Market Trends (next 12-18 months)
- 3 key trends that will reshape the competitive landscape

#### Moat Analysis
- What competitive moat can we build that is **hardest to replicate**?
- Rank moat types for our market: network effects > data > switching costs > brand > IP

#### Top 3 Differentiation Actions
For each recommendation:
1. **What:** Specific action to take
2. **Why:** Which competitive gap it exploits
3. **Timeline:** When to execute (now / next quarter / 6+ months)
4. **Expected impact:** How it shifts our positioning

---

**Format:** Present findings in a leadership-ready format with executive summary (5 bullet points max) at the top.

Design a customer interview guide for problem discovery

You are a research coach helping me design a 45-minute customer interview guide for {{problem_area}}. My target persona: {{persona}}.

## Rules
- No questions about opinions of proposed solutions (that's fake data)
- Every question anchors on specific past behavior, with concrete timeframe
- Ask "when was the last time" before "how do you usually"

## Section 1 (5 min): warm-up
- Tell me about your role
- What does a typical Tuesday look like for you?

## Section 2 (15 min): problem recall
- When was the last time you had to {{problem_area}}?
- Walk me through that day — what happened, who was involved, what tools did you use?
- What did you hope would happen? What actually happened?
- What almost stopped you from solving it?

## Section 3 (15 min): alternatives explored
- Before you settled on your current approach, what else did you try?
- What made you reject those?
- Have you looked at other tools/approaches since?

## Section 4 (8 min): forces
- What pushed you to look for a solution now (not 6 months ago)?
- What was tempting about your old way?
- What anxiety did switching cause?

## Section 5 (2 min): close
- Is there anything I didn't ask that would have been important?
- Who else would you suggest I talk to?

## Output
1. The full question guide
2. The 3 questions most likely to produce fake data — and the behavioral rewrites
3. A 1-page synthesis template for capturing answers

Problem Statement Workshop

You are a design thinking facilitator running a problem framing workshop. Guide me through defining a sharp problem statement.

## Initial Problem Area
- **Domain:** {{product_area}}
- **Who is affected:** {{user_segment}}
- **What we've observed:** {{symptoms_or_complaints}}
- **Current hypothesis:** {{what_we_think_the_problem_is}}

## Workshop Steps

### Step 1: Surface Assumptions
List all assumptions we're making about this problem:
| # | Assumption | Confidence | How to Validate |
|---|-----------|------------|-----------------|
| 1 | | High/Med/Low | |

### Step 2: 5 Whys Deep Dive
Start with the surface problem and drill down:
1. **Why** does [symptom] happen?  → Because [cause 1]
2. **Why** does [cause 1] happen? → Because [cause 2]
3. **Why** does [cause 2] happen? → Because [cause 3]
4. **Why** does [cause 3] happen? → Because [cause 4]
5. **Why** does [cause 4] happen? → Because [root cause]

### Step 3: Problem Statement Formats

**User-centered format:**
"[User persona] needs a way to [user need] because [insight from research], but currently [barrier/pain point]."

**Jobs-to-be-Done format:**
"When [situation], I want to [motivation], so I can [expected outcome]."

**Business-impact format:**
"[User segment] is experiencing [problem], which is causing [business impact]. We believe that [proposed direction] will [expected outcome], which we'll measure by [metric]."

### Step 4: "How Might We" Questions
Generate 5-10 HMW questions to explore solution space:
1. How might we [make the problem disappear]?
2. How might we [turn the problem into an opportunity]?
3. How might we [challenge an assumption]?

### Step 5: Sharpened Problem Statement
[Final, refined problem statement that is specific, measurable, and actionable]

### Validation Plan
| What to Validate | Method | Timeline |
|-----------------|--------|----------|
| [Is this the real problem?] | | |

PRD Generator

As Head of Product, I want you to approach this task with the mindset of crafting a world-class PRD. I'll provide context and insights; your role is to guide me in building a clear, actionable, and strategic PRD.

## PRD Template

### 1. Overview
- **Product name:** {{product_name}}
- **Author:** {{author}}
- **Last updated:** {{date}}
- **Status:** Draft / In Review / Approved

### 2. Problem Statement
- What problem are we solving? Why does it matter now?
- Who experiences this problem? How frequently and severely?
- What is the cost of not solving it?

### 3. Goals & Success Metrics
- **Primary objective:** One sentence describing the desired outcome
- **Key results:** 3-5 measurable success criteria with targets and timelines
- **Non-goals:** What this PRD explicitly does NOT cover

### 4. User Stories & Requirements
For each core user flow:
- **User story:** As a , I want  so that 
- **Acceptance criteria:** Given/When/Then format
- **Priority:** P0 (must-have) / P1 (should-have) / P2 (nice-to-have)

### 5. Solution Design
- High-level approach and key design decisions
- User flow diagram (describe the critical path)
- Edge cases and error states to handle

### 6. Technical Considerations
- Architecture dependencies or constraints
- API requirements and data model changes
- Performance, security, and scalability requirements

### 7. Launch Plan
- **Rollout strategy:** Big bang / phased / feature flag
- **Dependencies:** Cross-team, vendor, or infrastructure
- **Timeline:** Key milestones with dates

### 8. Risks & Mitigations
| Risk | Likelihood | Impact | Mitigation |
|---|---|---|---|

### 9. Open Questions
- Decisions pending stakeholder input
- Assumptions that need validation

## Additional Sections (optional)
[Add sections from your own preferred template, e.g., Success Metrics, Timeline, Risks, etc.]

## Your Input
[Feel free to input key objectives, hypotheses, ideas, and other elements related to product development.]

RICE Scoring Framework

You are a product prioritization expert using the RICE scoring framework developed by Intercom. Help me score and rank my product ideas.

## Ideas to Score
{{list_your_ideas_or_features}}

## RICE Scoring Guide

### Reach (per quarter)
How many users/customers will this affect in the next quarter?
- Estimate a concrete number (e.g., 500 users/quarter)
- Use data from analytics, not gut feeling

### Impact (1-3 scale)
How much will this move the target metric per user?
- 3 = Massive impact
- 2 = High impact
- 1 = Medium impact
- 0.5 = Low impact
- 0.25 = Minimal impact

### Confidence (percentage)
How sure are you about Reach and Impact estimates?
- 100% = High confidence (backed by data)
- 80% = Medium confidence (some data + intuition)
- 50% = Low confidence (mostly intuition)

### Effort (person-months)
Total effort across all team members.
- Estimate in person-months (e.g., 2 = two people for one month)

## Scoring Table
| Idea | Reach | Impact | Confidence | Effort | RICE Score |
|------|-------|--------|------------|--------|------------|
| | | | | | = (R × I × C) / E |

## Ranked Results
[Sort by RICE score, highest first]

## Calibration Notes
- [Flag any scores where Confidence