# Product vision and value proposition > What a product vision is and how a mission, a product vision and a product strategy differ, how to fill in a value proposition template, how Sofia compresses it into a one-line vision for CatChow, and three product vision examples. - Course: [Outcome-Based Product Roadmaps](https://productovi.com/courses/outcome-based-roadmaps.md) - Module: The why behind the roadmap - Lesson 5/15, ~41 min - Source: https://productovi.com/courses/outcome-based-roadmaps/product-vision ## Mission vs vision vs strategy **Alex Tutor:** Still at CatChow, still building next year's roadmap for Ian, and the inputs are coming in. **Sofia:** The problem lists are all in, and the same three problems keep coming up. Now Ian wants the board slides to open with the vision. **Ian:** We already have a mission on the website: “Healthy food for every cat, delivered to your door.” Can't we put that on the first slide and call it the vision? **Alex Tutor:** They do different jobs. A **mission** says what the company does now, and for whom. A **product vision** describes the future the product is working towards: who benefits and how their life is different. **Sofia:** So the mission is what we do every day, and the vision is what it all adds up to? **Alex Tutor:** Nicely put. Between them sits the **product strategy**: the path you choose from here to the vision. Which customers and problems to focus on, which bets to make, which objectives will show progress. ![A blue delivery van works at the near end of a landscape, a lighthouse glows on the horizon, and one road is chosen among several paths between them.](https://productovi.com/courses/outcome-based-roadmaps/inline/product-vision-illustration-2.webp) *Mission is today, vision is the future, strategy is the path between them.* **Sofia:** And the roadmap? **Alex Tutor:** The roadmap is the strategy put in order and written so people can read it. Without a vision above it, it's just a list. > **Exercise:** Match each CatChow statement to what it is. ## What a vision is not **Sofia:** Ian has a backup idea: “Become the number one pet food brand in Ukraine.” He says the board will love it. **Alex Tutor:** The board might. Customers won't notice. That sentence is about CatChow, not about anyone CatChow serves, so it tells the team nothing about what to build or what to skip. ![A person on a podium with a trophy shouts through a megaphone while cat owners with shopping bags walk past without looking up.](https://productovi.com/courses/outcome-based-roadmaps/inline/product-vision-illustration-3.webp) **Sofia:** But being number one is a real goal for him. **Alex Tutor:** A fair ambition, and it belongs in the business objectives. A vision can say what success means for the company too, but it has to start from the customer. **Sofia:** What else doesn't belong in a vision? **Alex Tutor:** A feature list, a date, a revenue number, and words like “best” or “innovative” that any company could claim. > **Exercise:** “Become the number one pet food brand in Ukraine” is a strong product vision, because it is ambitious and easy to remember. ## A value proposition template **Sofia:** So how do I get from my draft to something better? “Cat owners never have to think about running out of the right food.” **Alex Tutor:** Start wider, then compress. A **value proposition** spells out who the product is for, what they need, what it gives them and how it differs from the alternatives. **Alex Tutor:** A common template fits it into two sentences: “For [customer] who [need], [product] is a [category] that [benefit]. Unlike [alternative], it [difference].” Each slot forces a choice you might otherwise skip. **Sofia:** Let me try the first slot for our subscribers: “For cat owners aged 25 to 40 in big cities…” **Alex Tutor:** That's a demographic, not a need. What do they struggle with? Your inputs already say it: food running out between deliveries, and not knowing which food to choose. > **Exercise:** Which option fills the “who [need]” slot of CatChow's **value proposition** with a need, rather than a demographic or a feature? ## Unlike what? **Sofia:** Take two. “For cat owners who want their cat on the right food without it ever running out, CatChow is a cat food subscription that…” **Alex Tutor:** “…delivers the right food on the owner's schedule.” Now the hardest slot: unlike what? **Sofia:** Unlike pet shops and marketplaces? They sell the same bags. **Alex Tutor:** Then the difference can't be the bag. What do we do that a shop doesn't? We help people choose the food, and we can make sure it arrives before it runs out. **Sofia:** “Unlike pet shops, CatChow helps you choose the right food and makes sure the next bag arrives before the last one is empty.” I like that. ![Each slot forces a choice: for cat owners who want the right food without running out, a subscription that, unlike pet shops, helps choose and delivers in time.](https://productovi.com/courses/outcome-based-roadmaps/diagrams/m2-l2-value-proposition.png) *The template is a thinking tool, not a slogan.* **Alex Tutor:** Good. It reads a bit mechanically, and that's fine: the template is a thinking tool, not a slogan for the website. > **Exercise:** An online English school for IT specialists is filling the “unlike [alternative]” slot. Which line gives a real difference? **Alex Tutor:** The same template works for the clinics. Try their hardest slot first: unlike what? > **Exercise:** Which “unlike” line gives CatChow's value proposition for vet clinics a real difference? ## Clinics in or out **Brandon:** Quick check before this goes to the board: are my clinics in the vision? If it only says cat owners, clinic directors will think we're just a shop for consumers. **Sofia:** Ian made the clinic channel one of his two objectives. Leaving the clinics out of the vision would be strange. **Alex Tutor:** Agreed. Check it the other way round: could a clinic theme trace back to a vision about cat owners only? Only through a detour. Better to name them. **Sofia:** But a vision for two kinds of customers gets long. **Alex Tutor:** Not if they share the need. Owners and clinics both want the right food on hand when it's needed. One sentence can hold both. > **Exercise:** Why should CatChow's vision name vet clinics as well as cat owners? Select all that apply. ## One breath **Ian:** Keep it short. If I can't say it in one breath, the board won't remember it. **Alex Tutor:** He's right. Now compress. Keep who benefits and what changes for them. Drop the category and the competitor: they've done their work in the template. **Sofia:** Owners and clinics, the right food, never running out… “Every cat eats the right food, and neither owners nor vet clinics ever have to worry about running out.” **Alex Tutor:** That's a vision. One breath, two kinds of customers, one need, no features. ![A person blows one large soap bubble; inside it float a cat eating from a full bowl and a neatly stocked clinic shelf.](https://productovi.com/courses/outcome-based-roadmaps/inline/product-vision-illustration-4.webp) *Who benefits and what changes for them, said in one breath.* **Sofia:** Much better than “number one brand”. **Alex Tutor:** And the difference from shops didn't vanish: it lives in the value proposition, which sales and marketing will use. The vision keeps only what everyone must remember. > **Exercise:** A Ukrainian service for small cafés has this value proposition: “For owners of small cafés who lose hours every week ordering from a dozen suppliers, it is an ordering platform that puts all suppliers in one cart. Unlike phoning each supplier, it tracks what's running low and suggests the next order.” Which is the best one-line vision? **Alex Tutor:** One more test for the new vision: does it rule anything out? Try it on two spreadsheet ideas. **Dataset (CSV):** [CatChow's request spreadsheet](https://productovi.com/datasets/outcome-based-roadmaps/product-vision/catchow-requests.csv) The 40 feature requests from sales, support and the founders that the product team starts the course with, in the order they sit in the spreadsheet. Synthetic data made for this course. - `id`: Row ID - `request`: The request as written in the spreadsheet - `source`: Who asked: sales, support or the founders > **Exercise:** CatChow's vision: “Every cat eats the right food, and neither owners nor vet clinics ever have to worry about running out.” Which spreadsheet idea does it rule out? ## A pitch for the clinics **Brandon:** Can I get the clinic version of that template? I'd use it when I talk to new clinics. **Sofia:** Sure. The customer is the clinic, and the need is… prescription diets in stock without hours on the phone? **Alex Tutor:** That's the pain Brandon heard at PurrPoint. Keep it in the clinic's words, not ours. And think hard about the alternative: who do clinics order from today? **Sofia:** Distributors, by phone. So our difference has to be more than “we also take calls”. **Alex Tutor:** Exactly. And don't promise a solution we haven't chosen yet. A value proposition states the benefit, not the feature. > **Exercise:** Write CatChow's value proposition for vet clinics in two sentences, using the template: “For… who…, CatChow is a… that…. Unlike…, it…”. Name the benefit, not a solution the team hasn't chosen yet. ## Does it rule anything out? **Lucy:** Nice sentence. But will it help me say no to anything? Every quarter someone brings me something shiny. **Alex Tutor:** Good test. A useful vision is specific enough to rule things out. Try it on the spreadsheet. **Sofia:** Reminders, flexible delivery dates, the food-picker quiz, Brandon's bulk ordering: all about the right food, on hand. Birthday greetings for cats: cute, but no. **Lucy:** Now that I can use in planning. **Alex Tutor:** One more job for it: the vision opens every version of the roadmap, for every audience. Ian's first slide should start there and then show how the two objectives serve it. > **Exercise:** Write the opening of Ian's first board slide (2–3 sentences): CatChow's product vision in one line, covering cat owners and vet clinics, and how the two business objectives serve it. No features, no dates. ## Case: a bookstore's first slide **Alex Tutor:** Remember the online bookstore with the quarterly plan? Its head of e-commerce has now drafted a vision slide for the next roadmap. **Sofia:** Let me guess: “number one” and a feature list? **Alex Tutor:** Close enough. It has a vision, a mission and a strategy line. Each one has a different problem. **Sofia:** Then I'll check each line, run the template for their readers and compress it. **Alex Tutor:** And then use the vision the way Lucy would: see what it rules out. > **Exercise:** Critique and rewrite Chapterly's vision slide. ## Product vision examples **Alex Tutor:** Here are three product vision examples from companies you've met in this course. Each fits in one breath, starts from the customer and names no feature. The last column is the filter test. > **Three product vision examples** > > | Company | Product vision | What it rules out | > |---|---|---| > | CatChow, a cat food subscription | Every cat eats the right food, and neither owners nor vet clinics ever have to worry about running out. | Birthday greetings for cats | > | Chapterly, an online bookstore | Every reader always knows what to read next. | Animated 3D covers on product pages | > | Docketly, a document SaaS for accounting firms | Accountants never have to chase a client for a document again. | Dark mode, a new pricing page | > > **A one-line product vision statement template:** [who benefits] + [what changes for them], said in one breath. No features, dates, revenue numbers or “best”. **Sofia:** Docketly's is new. Where does it come from? **Alex Tutor:** From its inputs: about 40% of support tickets come from firms' clients who can't upload a scan from a phone, and accountants then chase them by email. The vision names the change. A phone upload is just one possible way there. ## What to remember **Sofia:** Ian gets a vision he can say in one breath, Brandon gets his clinics in it and a pitch, and Lucy gets a filter. **Alex Tutor:** And every theme on the roadmap now has something to trace back to. That's the vision's job. > **Key ideas** > > - A **mission** says what the company does now and for whom; a **product vision** describes the future the product works towards; the **product strategy** is the path between them, and the roadmap puts it in order. > - A good vision names who benefits and what changes for them, without features, dates, revenue targets or claims like “the best”. > - A **value proposition** template (for, who, is a, that, unlike) forces clear choices about customer, need, benefit and difference. > - Compress it into one line: keep who and what changes, drop the category and the competitor. > - A useful vision is specific enough to rule ideas out. **Alex Tutor:** Next time: the objectives. The board will ask how we'll know the vision is getting closer, and the answer is key results. - Previous lesson: [Gathering inputs: life cycle, market, customers, stakeholders](https://productovi.com/courses/outcome-based-roadmaps/gathering-inputs.md) - Next lesson: [Business objectives and key results](https://productovi.com/courses/outcome-based-roadmaps/objectives-and-key-results.md) --- Productovi Learning. Free, no sign-up needed to read.