Agile product development | Feature Implementation using Agile at zomato

Introduction:

Developing a new product from the scratch can be quite tricky and vague. Every Product Manager has to have a structured road-map that gives the business a clear path to follow.

The typical product development process generally involves the following steps:

· Conception of the Idea

· Market and user research

· Product planning

· Design

· Development

· Testing

· Deployment

· Maintenance

The Product Planning to Development stages are crucial and have to be done in the most efficient manner.

There are several ways to develop software, two of the most prominent methods being Waterfall and Agile.

Agile implementation is a form of project management that works in small increments and well suited to projects that could become irrelevant once delivered, especially useful in software development. The key to the agile plan is that it provides flexibility for changes to the product as it continues to be be developed.

The waterfall method is where progress goes from the idea, to analysis and design, to building the product, testing it, and then making it. An agile implementation methodology is an alternative in that it doesn’t require one phase of a project to be complete before the next portion can begin.

Agile Methodology:

“We dont need an accurate document, we need a shared understanding”

- Jeff Patton

What Agile methodology is rooted in collaborative, flexible and adaptive approach entailing quick response to customer needs and market changes. It’s built on the premise that the world now changes regularly, and that means software teams no longer have years to bring new products to market. In that time, competitor offerings or customer expectations can change, and the team risks irrelevance.

Different organisations have different needs and to help meet them, there are various agile methodologies. Which mix is right for your team will depend on your internal and external factors, needs and goals. The most popular agile methodologies include Extreme Programming (XP), Scrum, Lean Development, and Feature-Driven Development (FDD).

A Brief Intro to Scrum:

Scrum is one of the more popular and widely used Agile frameworks. Within the Agile framework called Scrum, there are two primary roles to fill: Scrum Master and Product Owner.

Your Scrum Master is the coach and the gatekeeper. The Scrum Master establishes responsibility for following the Agile framework, providing guidance and education to your Scrum Team and removing impediments and distractions that keep the team from doing work.

The Product Owner of your Scrum Team is first and foremost the subject matter expert for the given project. The Product Owner keeps track of the projects’ stakeholders’ expectations and defines and gathers the required tools and resources that the Scrum Team needs. In addition, the Product Owner communicates their vision to the team to help set priorities.

The Scrum Master and Product Owner organize and manage your Scrum Team that are actually doing the developing. This team tends to be made up of several members that are cross-disciplinary, including engineers, designers, architects, and testers.

Agile promotes a highly iterative process for application development, with multiple development cycles called sprints. Agile is designed in a way so all parties can provide feedback as software is developed in an efficient and effective manner.

Example of Agile implementation at Zomato:

1. Rate/review Restaurants

User ratings serve two purposes simultaneously — guidance for customers and information for businesses. Incremental & Iterative approach would involve staggered release of features, in stages.

Release 1:

Initial release could incorporate a Like/dislike button or rating on a scale of 5, for users to voluntarily share their experience.

Release 2:

Users can add photos and write detailed reviews for the restaurants.

Also, we can further incorporate the changes as to how well the initial release was welcomed by the users. For instance, users might want further splitting of the rating scale such that the rating ranges from 0 to 10.

Selecting reason/s behind the rating from an available list of curated options, to suffice the ratings.

Release 3:

This can incorporate tagging friends and family with reviews and ratings and share the same on social media platforms.

Also, it can be made mandatory for users to rate previous order before placing a new order.

Tagging photos can be made mandatory based on poor ratings and reasons that revolve around bad packaging etc.

2. Filters for search:

Release 1:

This can be released with basic search filters such as location of the restaurant, restaurant name, type of food whether veg or non veg.

Release 2:

This can be enhanced with rating and review filters, cuisines offered, pricing of food, restaurant type such as dine-in/take away.

Also, initial release might showcase need for filters that search by proximity from user’s location, order from restaurants that serve only vegetarian food.

This layer will help users add another layer to narrow down the results to their requirement.

Release 3:

Advanced filters can be introduced that help users search based on dish name, maximum order delivery time, restaurants with offers and deals, listings with free delivery options, selection of payment methods, that help serve them well.

3. Online Ordering:

Release 1:

Initial release needs to incorporate the most basic requirements to order online. It will involve features to select restaurant based on search and add items to cart along with quantity, view cart, add delivery location, integration with most used payment methods, track order from the app, and rate food.

Further, a toll number can be made available for customer support.

Release 2:

This release will smoothen the online ordering experience.

Features like auto-picking of user location and showing results based on serviceability. Option to tag delivery location with Work/Home/Other. Re-order from the list of previous orders.

Integrating other payment modes to cater more customers. Push notifications to track order and a call back feature for customer support.

Release 3:

The user can be give a feature to micro-track the order with food preparation, food pickup and delivery agent tracking details.

Intelligence can be added to help users with customer support by adding a list of commonly faced problems and letting users select from the available list, and if user is still not satisfied, a call option can be made available.

Further, rewarding of customers can be incorporated, for inviting friends and family, placing orders above a certain amount in a particular day.

Conclusion:

Agile development, in its simplest form, offers a lightweight framework for helping teams, given a constantly evolving functional and technical landscape, maintain a focus on the rapid delivery of business value.

The agile model is a combination of both iterative and incremental model by breaking a product into components where on each cycle or iteration, a working model of a component is delivered.

The model produces ongoing releases (iterative), each time adding small changes to the previous release (iterative). During each iteration, as the product is being built, it is also tested to ensure that at the end of the iteration the product is shippable.

Agile approach accelerates the delivery of business value, through building high quality products, higher customer satisfaction, increased control over the product, reduced risks and improved return on investment.