Product & UX Glossary

When UX professionals speak the language and understand the business roles of product managers, they can confidently enter strategic dialogues on equal footing. Using the same vernacular as a product manager is one of the most effective ways to build competence, trust, and influence.

The following glossary includes relevant terms product managers often use to describe the inner workings of an organization, strategies, product development processes, and issues.

Jump to a definition in the table or review the complete glossary:

Advertisement-Based Revenue Model

A business-revenue model in which a product sells advertisement spaces in its product. There are variations on this model, but the classic model multiplies the number of ad impressions or clicks by the revenue generated per impression or click.

Blue-Ocean Strategy 

A business approach coined by Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne that focuses on creating new market spaces and value by significantly differentiating from competitors while minimizing costs.

Bottleneck

A system slowdown caused by an incoming volume of work or requests that surpasses the processing capacity of the system.

Business-Model Canvas

A framework developed by Alexander Osterwalder that maps the nine components of a business model and is used to strategize and evolve an organization’s approach. It includes the following components: revenue streams, cost structure, value propositions, customer segments, customer relationships, channels, key resources, key activities, and key partnerships.

Business-Requirement Document (BRD)

A document that concisely summarizes a project’s background, goals, requirements, scope, constraints, governance, responsibilities, and success metrics. 

Cannibalization

When a new product offering detracts from the sales of an existing product offering instead of attracting new customers because it appeals to the same customer base.

Continuous Delivery

A code deployment technique where a developer’s most recently tested code changes are automatically deployed into a test or production environment with the click of a button. This process gives a human the agency to review changes before they “go live.”

Continuous Deployment

A code deployment technique where a developer’s latest code changes are automatically deployed into a test or production environment as soon as they are ready. It does not require a human to review changes before they “go live” into production. In this model, there are no “release days” because changes are constantly deployed.

Continuous DevOps

A series of techniques in software development where code changes are frequently tested and integrated. These include continuous integration, continuous delivery, and continuous deployment. These techniques can shorten the development cycle and help teams iterate faster, yet they require extremely thorough testing to be effective.

Continuous Integration

 A development technique in which developers frequently test and integrate their code changes into a shared codebase. Continuous integration allows the team to find issues and iterate efficiently. It tests that new pieces of code will work with existing code, and that API services called through the backend return the expected information. This technique can help product teams shorten their development cycles, and it is often used in conjunction with Continuous Delivery or Continuous Deployment.

Customer-Acquisition Cost (CAC)

The total expenses required for an organization to acquire one new customer. To calculate CAC, organizations add up the amounts spent on marketing, sales, technology, operations, and people and divide that amount by the total number of new customers acquired in that period. Organizations often seek to reduce CAC while driving up conversions.

Customer-Feedback Loop (Voice of Customer)

A system for continuously acquiring, analyzing, and using customer feedback to improve business operations, products, and services. Customer feedback may come from surveys, feedback forms, interviews, review sites, social media, and customer-service logs.

Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)

A measurement of a customer’s value during the span of their relationship with the organization. To calculate CLV, organizations look at how long customer relationships last and how much revenue those customers generate to algorithmically predict what future customer relationships might yield. 

Feature Creep (Feature Bloat)

A product state in which the team continues to add features to the detriment of product usability and utility. Feature creep happens when teams feel pressure to add features to keep parity with competitors or when they lack a clear vision and strategy.

Feature Flag

A development technique that allows developers to quickly enable or disable certain product functionalities without a deployment. It is valuable for A/B testing, product experimentation, and quick rollback in the case of bugs or issues.

Feature Parity

A state in which all versions of a product across devices and channels include the same set of functionality. 

Freemium-Revenue Model

A revenue model in which users gain access to a subset of a product’s functionality for free and must pay to gain access to the full, premium set of features.

Go-to-Market Strategy

A comprehensive plan outlining how an organization will launch a new product or service to target customers and drive conversions. It includes the following key components: specification of the target market and its size, value proposition, market positioning relative to competitors, sales strategy (if applicable), marketing strategy, distribution plan, customer-support strategy, budget, timeline, and key metrics to track for a customer-feedback loop.

Hypothesis-Driven Development

An evidence-based approach to product development that includes creating and testing hypotheses through experiments. It involves testing prototypes with users or launching new product versions live to customers. Testing risky hypotheses is an excellent way to reduce the risk that the team builds something without utility.

• Related Video: What, When, Why: Research Goals, Questions, and Hypotheses
• See also: minimum viable product (MVP), product roadmap, product manager, strategy canvas, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) analysis

Jobs to Be Done (JTBD)

A framework for setting product goals based on the “job” a product does for a customer. It works by asking the question: “What jobs does the customer need to do to achieve their goals?” This framing helps teams focus on meaningful outcomes for the customer, rather than on shiny features with low utility.

Lifetime Value-to-Customer Acquisition Ratio

The ratio between the customer lifetime value and the customer-acquisition cost. This measure is used to determine the profitability of acquiring a customer segment. If the ratio is greater than 1, the revenue generated by the customer is larger than the cost to acquire them, which indicates a profitable opportunity. If the ratio is approximately 1, the cost to acquire them equals the revenue they’ll generate. If the ratio is less than 1, the cost to acquire them exceeds the revenue they’ll generate, which means the business would lose money.

Minimum Viable Product (MVP)

 A reasonable representation of a product that maximizes feedback on its core value proposition with minimal resources.

Objectives and Key Results (OKRs)

A framework, originally created by John Doerr, for setting achievable, measurable outcomes for the organizations. An objective is a qualitative goal that’s achievable within a quarter, while key results are metrics that can be tracked over time to determine whether the team is moving closer to achieving the objective.

Pivot

A significant change in the business strategy, which requires teams in the organization to shift their focus and potentially their approach to product development. A pivot may be the result of market changes and pressures, falling revenue, new technological advancements, or the discovery of a significantly better long-term opportunity.

Product Decline

The fourth stage in the product lifecycle, where a product experiences a decline in revenue because of significant market competition, and it must choose a new business strategy to survive. Some strategies include differentiation, lowering costs, or offering significantly new value at a low cost to an untapped market.

Product Growth

The second stage in the product lifecycle, when a product experiences growing demand and revenue and must scale the delivery of its offerings to accommodate the demand.

Product Introduction

The first stage in the product lifecycle, when a product is first introduced to the market through a go-to-market strategy that seeks to capture the target market.

Product Maturity

The third stage in the product lifecycle, where the product generates significant and sustainable profits, yet may face growing competition that threatens its market position.

Product-Led Growth

A business strategy where the product experience informs how all areas of the business function. It often involves enabling users to try a product and experience its value before they pay for it. Successful product-led growth relies on strong product utility and usability and requires that all roles understand users and harness that knowledge in their work.

Product–Market Fit

A product-progression stage in which a product is delivering ongoing value to its users and the business, which sustains and scales business growth. 

Product Manager (Product Owner)

A product-team member responsible for creating a strategy that delivers value to the business and users, communicating the strategy to partners, and seeing it through to execution.

Product Roadmap

A high-level, living artifact that prioritizes and communicates a product team’s future work and problems to solve. It represents all areas of the product team and its dependencies, including UX, development, marketing, sales, compliance, legal, and finance. Even though the product manager typically owns the product roadmap, they involve all crossfunctional partners in its creation to ensure it’s well-informed and evidence-based.

Product Vision

An aspirational statement that describes the future impact and value that a product or service will provide to its users.

Red Ocean

A concept coined by Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne to describe a market with many similar products that compete against each other. In a red ocean, teams must appeal to customers through differentiation or low cost.

Responsibility-Assignment Matrix (RACI)

A framework that outlines how individuals or teams with different specializations will participate in various tasks such as discovery, usability testing, or the creation of a deliverable. Clarifying roles and responsibilities helps teams work efficiently, iteratively, and in harmony.

Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats (SWOT) Analysis

A one-page strategic framework that maps an organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. It creates a big picture of the current state of the business, in order to facilitate strategic dialogues.

Strategy Canvas

A one-page framework developed by Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne, that maps the key competing factors in an industry against the level of value delivered by the main competitors in each of those categories. 

Subscription-Revenue Model

A business-revenue model in which customers gain access to a service for a set period of time by paying a fee at regular time intervals, such as monthly or annually. 

Target Market

A defined group of people who are the intended customers of a product. They are defined according to their demographics, behaviors, and needs.

Time to Value

The time it takes for a user to unlock the product’s unique core value, defined in the value proposition.

Total Addressable Market (TAM)

An estimate of the total revenue that a market of customers could generate for an organization. It is calculated by multiplying the number of potential customers (people who would both value an offering and have the means to afford it) by the revenue an average buyer could reasonably generate. TAM is one factor product managers consider when determining whether to pursue a new market opportunity.

UX Debt

The cost associated with opting for a quick, short-term fix over a sustainable long-term solution that considers the overall user experience of the product. The causes of UX debt include lack of user research, feature creep, technical constraints, a lack of iterative processes, and weak team communication. Leaving UX debt unresolved risks lower user satisfaction, brand perception, and retention rates.

Value Proposition

The unique value a customer derives from a product.