In our last article, we walked through what a product strategy is, why it’s important, and how management consultants like McKinsey and Bain consultants approach product strategy.
In this article, we’ve compiled a cheat sheet for creating your own, best-practice product strategy presentation. Where our previous article covers the full framework, this one gives you the practical tools: some constructive definitions, best-practice tips, and a checklist to pressure-test your deck before it goes to leadership.
A product strategy deck outlines your core hypotheses on which customer you’re building for, how to create value for them, and in what priority that value should be built. It is distinct from a list of features or a roadmap — those are tactics. The strategy is the “why” that makes the tactics make sense.
A solid product strategy is necessary because it:
Read our in-depth article to get a better understanding of the role a product strategy plays in the strategy hierarchy.
The most effective product strategy presentations are built around seven core questions. If your deck can answer these questions clearly, you have a strong foundation:
These seven questions will have varying weight and length of answers depending on what type of product you have, where you are in the product life cycle, what the surrounding organizational context is, and what type of product strategy deck you’re creating.
For example, an established product already in stores may focus less on fundamentals like brand and value proposition and more on reaching new customers, adding new variants, or changing elements of production to e.g., lower costs. A not-yet-started corporate venture or completely new product line on the other hand will need in-depth answers to all these questions.
The implicit assumption in the first situation is that all questions have already been answered so small tweaks are enough.
Product strategy and go-to-market strategy are closely linked but distinct. Confusing them is one of the most common mistakes product teams make when building their decks.
Not every deck should be a full end-to-end strategy document. Instead, the format should match the purpose. Here are three archetypical types of product strategy decks:
These are the principles that separate a good product strategy deck from a great one, based on our years of building and advising on product strategies at McKinsey, BCG, and Bain and beyond:
Use this checklist to audit your deck before it goes to leadership. It goes into the six areas above in a straight-forward manner: strategic context, focus and strategic choices, analytical foundation, strategic initiatives, monitoring and managing, and communicating your strategy.
Overall goal: Understand and embed your product in the broader organizational context to ensure optimal chances of support from stakeholders and ultimately success.
If you want to go deeper on the framework behind this cheat sheet, read our full guide: How to Create a Great Product Strategy: What Can We Learn From McKinsey?
And if you’re ready to build your deck, our McKinsey-style Product Strategy template includes 500+ slides, three Excel models, and five real Fortune 500 examples - so you can focus on your strategy, not the formatting.
A product strategy cheat sheet is a condensed reference guide that captures the key structure, questions, tips, and checklist items needed to build a best-practice product strategy deck. It’s designed to be used alongside, not instead of, a full product strategy framework.
A best-practice product strategy deck should answer seven key questions: where you’re going, where you see an opportunity, whether there’s space to play, how you’ll win, what your plan is, what the numbers look like, and what the next steps are. It should also include a clear strategic context, well-defined focus and choices, a strong analytical foundation, and concrete strategic initiatives.
The length depends on the type of deck. A weekly or quarterly update can be 5–10 slides. An annual strategy refresh for an existing product is typically 15–25+ slides. A full product strategy for a new product or venture may be 30–100+ slides, often accompanied by a shorter executive summary version.
A product strategy defines the “why” and the “what” at a high level — the vision, the customer, the value proposition, and the strategic choices. A product roadmap is more tactical: it covers the “how” and “when,” with specific features, releases, and timelines. The strategy drives the roadmap, not the other way around.
MBB-quality product strategies are grounded in rigorous analysis, make explicit strategic choices (including what they will not do), connect clearly to the broader business context, and are communicated with clarity and precision. They use best-practice approaches to slide writing and presentation building to make sure key points stand out and the whole deck is tailored to leadership audiences.
