Are All Features Necessary?

Feature rich is a term you may hear when evaluating software platforms or something you may say when describing the future state of your own technology. A feature is a component that is more or less a standalone item that provides some functionality and satisfies certain defined requirements. The common notion is that the more features the better. This may not necessarily be true for every piece of software or concept. It is possible to be tempted to take a feature inclusive mindset when discussing your future tech. Sometimes, feature bloat creates a trap for your precious time, energy, and resources. Here are considerations when evaluating features and whether or not you should include them in your next software build:

If You Build It, Will They Come?

If you already have a product created that is being used you are in luck – you have a perfect opportunity to survey the user base to find out if they would care for and use the feature you are conceptualizing. You may also have some data points from inbound requests, analytics, or other interactions that can help you deduce the value and necessity of the feature. If you don't have a software product already and you are in the planning stages your job is a little harder. Who can you go to for the same questions and surveys? You will have to determine who your potential users are and find creative ways to ask if a feature will be valuable. Competitive analysis is also a viable way to assert value (however, you need to be aware that your competitors could be fishing for customers by stating a feature exists, or, have a feature that goes unused because they did not pursue finding out true necessity. Do not skip this step – I can assure you it's valuable and necessary. Your feature must answer a real need.

Can You Support It?

Not every organization is set up to adequately support some of the features of the software it provides. You ask, how can this be so? There are some features that can be extremely convoluted to use that will trip up even a sophisticated user, or, perhaps, produce complex results that make it seem like it's a black box. If you have a complex process you need integrated I suggest working with a usability expert to distill it down to a set of steps everyone can work with. For complicated outputs have a FAQ or other self-service function that can inform the user what the technology is doing behind the scenes. These will help inspire confidence with users and mitigate potential support tickets.

Does It Add Enough ROI To Justify The Build?

Adding features = adding cost. How will you know if the cost is worth taking on? Here are some questions to ask to help answer that: -What business problem does this solve? -What efficiencies will this create? -Is this a differentiator? -Will this allow me to bring more customers/users/clients onto the software? -What is the cost of me not adding this feature? Calculating the ROI on a feature can be a little tricky and, in my opinion, does not have an exact formula to follow. The point being the consideration of many factors that should go well beyond just being flashy or cool.

Having provided the above points, I don’t want to undercut that there is value to having plenty of features; features that support your company's mission, provide seamless experiences, and ones that return on the promise of offering value to the users. You may want to lots and lots of features, but, perhaps expanding your offering over time should be the ideal. Growing your feature set and introducing them over time will surprise and delight your users as well as keep them feeling the impact in your investment of their success by investing in your platform.