Product Strategy vs. UX Strategy: Who Decides What
Product strategy decides which problem to solve and for whom; UX strategy, how the experience will feel. How the two relate, and which one to write first.
What does each one decide?
Product strategy answers broad questions: who the customer is, what problem gets solved, how people are acquired and retained, what revenue the product generates, and how it compares with other options. Jeff Gothelf, in a 2014 essay on the topic, lists questions of this kind (who the product is for, what problem it solves, how it attracts and retains users, how it makes money, who it competes with) and argues they should be answered collectively (Gothelf: There is no such thing as UX strategy).
UX strategy answers narrower and deeper questions: how the product will be experienced, what feeling it should leave, and how to communicate that target to the team. Andy Budd, of Clearleft, describes it in a 2016 article as a user-centered lens on a digital product: whoever does UX strategy explores possible scenarios, advises leadership, and communicates the target experience with concept models and diagrams (Clearleft: Is UX strategy a thing?).
How do they relate?
There are three positions in practice:
| Position | Who holds it | What it implies |
|---|---|---|
| Nested | Gothelf | UX is part of product strategy. There is no separate document. |
| Overlapping | Budd | They resemble business strategy and marketing strategy: product strategy is wider and less deep, UX strategy has a narrower, deeper focus. |
| Its own plan | NN/g | UX strategy is a plan of actions, with a time horizon, to improve the organization’s experience. |
The NN/g position is the most practical for a designer who has no product manager dedicated to strategy. It defines UX strategy as “a plan of actions designed to reach an improved future state of the organization’s user experience over an established period of time.” It adds that research should inform every part of the strategy and that goals and KPIs should tie to business objectives (NN/g: UX Strategy).
What all three positions share is that experience cannot be planned in isolation. If a UX strategy proposes something the business cannot sustain, it is not a strategy. And if the product strategy ignores experience, it produces features nobody knows how to use.
To see how that relationship plays out day to day, read working with product managers and dual-track agile, which explains how discovery and delivery are divided.
What components does a UX strategy have?
NN/g identifies three main components (NN/g: UX Strategy):
- A vision: how the experience should feel and work in the future.
- Goals and measures: objectives tied to business KPIs, with clear indicators.
- A plan: what will be done and when.
The strategy also needs people, processes, and tools to sustain it. NN/g describes DesignOps as the orchestration and optimization of people, processes, and craft. The same article warns that plans should describe, not prescribe: the plan communicates what to consider and when, but the team decides how to research and which solutions to pursue.
When should you NOT write a separate UX strategy?
- If your product is small and the team fits around one table, a one-page product strategy that includes the experience is enough.
- If no product strategy exists yet, writing a UX strategy without one produces a vision of experience with no business behind it. Start with the product.
- If the UX strategy becomes a document nobody consults, it stops being useful. A roadmap with two clear objectives, like a design roadmap, usually does more work.
Illustrative example
Illustrative example: a travel booking company wants to reduce last-minute cancellations. The product strategy decides the goal is to retain revenue without pushing people into fees they do not understand. The UX strategy turns that into an experience: when someone wants to cancel, the screen clearly shows what will be refunded, offers to change the date before cancelling, and does not hide the cancel option. The UX goals are measured by the rate of date changes and by complaints about charges, not only by the number of cancellations. If the team measures only cancellations, the UX strategy will fail silently.
Common mistakes
- Writing a UX strategy with goals that do not connect to any business KPI.
- Believing product strategy belongs only to the product manager, and that design just executes.
- Treating the strategy as a finished document instead of a hypothesis reviewed every quarter.
- Using the experience vision as an excuse to avoid discussing costs or feasibility.
- Calling a list of screens to redesign a “strategy.”
What you can do tomorrow
- Write in one sentence which business problem your product solves and for whom. If you cannot, that is the first conversation to have.
- Ask your product manager for the three KPIs the team reviews each month, and think about which experience moves them.
- Replace a goal of “improve the experience” with a concrete measure that can change within a quarter.