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PRODUCT

Product management consulting for startups

Product management consulting for startups is senior help to decide what to build, for whom and at what price. Founders bring us a first idea; scale-ups and established teams bring a stuck roadmap or an empty product seat.

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Led by Roger GrekosCo-Founder, product

The drawing shows an opportunity solution tree with one goal on top and, under it, the problems, ideas and cheap tests that feed a written decision log.

Use us as a product management consultancy for a second opinion on one decision, or let our product management services run the work: validation, discovery, user testing, UX and UI, pricing and scale planning. You end up with evidence and a plan your engineers can build from.

01THE FULL LIST

All product consulting services

Nine product services, each with its own page, scope and engagement options.

  1. Fractional product manager

    A senior product lead, part time: discovery, roadmap and delivery without a full-time hire.

  2. Product strategy

    Decide who the product serves, what to build next and what to drop, with evidence behind each call.

  3. Product discovery

    Customer interviews, workshops and prototypes that show what customers will pay for before you build.

  4. Idea validation

    Research, interviews and smoke tests that end in a go, pivot or stop decision before you build.

  5. Usability testing

    Moderated and remote sessions with real users, turned into a ranked list of fixes.

  6. UX audit

    A ranked review of your onboarding, key flows, accessibility and conversion, with a suggested fix for every issue.

  7. UX/UI design

    SaaS UX and UI design for startups: flows, screens, design systems and prototypes your engineers can build.

  8. Pricing and monetization

    Pricing strategy for startups: value metric, plans, usage pricing and price tests, built into a monetization plan.

  9. Scale planning

    A staged plan for your next stage of growth: team shape, process, product operations and the systems behind them.

02IN BRIEF

Which product service to start with

Start with the question you cannot answer yet. If it is whether anyone wants this, start with evidence. If it is what to build next, start with discovery. If it is why users leave, start with testing. Each service has its own page:

Consulting firm or product agency: what's the difference?

A product management consulting firm advises: it reviews your strategy, research or roadmap and tells you what it would do and why. A product management agency executes: it runs the research, writes the specs, designs the screens and manages the backlog. Startups often need both at different moments, which is why we offer both from the same people.

Early on, a founder usually needs advice on one decision, such as which customer segment to target first or whether to raise prices. Later, the bottleneck is capacity: interviews to run, tests to set up and a roadmap to keep honest week after week. The same people do the advising and the hands-on work, so the recommendation and the execution do not drift apart. You also avoid paying a second team to learn your product from scratch.

What evidence a startup needs before it builds

Before you commit money to a build, you need evidence on three things. The problem is real and painful, the people who have it will pay, and your solution fits how they already work. Interviews with the right people answer the first question. A demand test, such as a landing page with a price, a waitlist or a pre-sale, answers the second. A prototype test with a handful of target users answers the third.

Some things only look like evidence: friends who like the idea, answers about what people might do, and sign-ups with no price. We design each test so its result could change your mind. Before it runs, we write down what would make you go, pivot or stop. Each test is small on purpose, so a wrong guess costs days rather than months.

03

Product help by stage

Product questions change as the company grows. Pick your stage to see which services usually come first.

Your stage
  1. Illustration of evidence from interviews

    Pre-seed

    An idea and some conviction, and you need evidence that people want it before you spend on a build.

  2. Illustration of evidence from usage

    Seed

    A first product in users' hands, and you need a roadmap, real feedback and a price that works.

  3. Illustration of evidence from cohorts

    Series A+

    Growth is on the plan, or the product is already established, and pricing, process and the team have to keep up.

04STEP BY STEP

How product engagements work

Every product engagement follows the same three steps, so each decision rests on evidence you can see and keep using.

  1. 01

    Audit

    We review what you already know: analytics, interviews, support tickets, the product itself and the current plan. You get a short evidence summary and the questions that matter most.

  2. 02

    Build

    We run the work: interviews, tests, designs, a roadmap or a pricing experiment, with your team in the room so the knowledge stays with you.

  3. 03

    Ship

    We hand over decisions in writing: what we learned, what we recommend and what to do next. You also keep the roadmap, designs or research files the work produced.

Roger Grekos

05

Product is led by Roger Grekos

Roger is our co-founder for product, projects and scale. He leads validation, discovery, UX, pricing and growth planning, and every product service on this page.

Good product work makes the next decision cheaper.

Roger GrekosCO-FOUNDER · PRODUCT
Roger Grekos
Co-Founder, Product, Project & Scale
Background
Roger co-founded BrainStormers and has led product for 12+ years across SaaS, fintech, media, gaming and services. At Find.co he led product strategy for a media portfolio whose revenue grew from $22M to $55M in three years; at PayEm he took a procurement platform to $1M ARR in 12 months.
Roger's profileLinkedIn

06TOGETHER

Need engineering too?

If the plan needs building, custom software product development puts Roger and Thanos on one plan, from the first interview to the release.

Product and engineering

07INSIGHTS

Product guides from Roger

Roger's guides cover how to validate SaaS ideas and how to run product discovery. Others answer "What is a UX audit?" and when you need one, and show how to build a product roadmap your team will follow.

  • SCALE STRATEGYGUIDE

    How to build a product roadmap

    How to build a product roadmap a startup can follow: formats, a seven-step process, RICE scoring, a copyable template, examples for three stages and habits that keep it honest.

    Roger Grekos

  • SCALE STRATEGYGUIDE

    How to find product-market fit

    How to find product-market fit: the signals that show it, how to run the product-market fit survey, the questions to ask, and what to change when the answer is no.

    Roger Grekos

  • PRODUCT VALIDATIONGUIDE

    How to validate a business idea with real evidence before you build

    How to validate a business idea before you write code: interviews, bottom-up sizing, smoke tests and pre-sales, with go, pivot or stop signals and real examples.

    Roger Grekos

08FAQ

Questions about product management consulting

What does product management consulting include?

It covers the decisions and the work between an idea and a product people pay for. That means validating demand, discovery with users, roadmaps and priorities, usability testing, UX and UI design, pricing and scale planning. You can use it as advice on one decision, as hands-on work with a fixed scope, or as a fractional product lead.

Do you advise, or do you run product work hands-on?

Both. As advisers we review your plan, research or roadmap and give you a written recommendation. Hands-on, we run the interviews, tests, designs and pricing experiments ourselves, or step in as a fractional product manager inside your team. You can start with advice and move to hands-on work once the priorities are clear.

What does industry-agnostic product consulting mean in practice?

It means we bring methods that work across markets rather than one industry's playbook. Interviews, demand tests, usability tests, prioritization and pricing experiments work the same way whether you sell to consumers, businesses or both. You bring the domain knowledge, we bring the discipline to test it, and we learn your market by talking to your users.

When should a startup hire its first product manager?

Usually when the founder can no longer make every product decision well. Common signs are a backlog nobody owns, engineers waiting on decisions and features shipped without anyone checking their effect. Another is a roadmap that changes with every customer call. A fractional product manager can cover that gap until a full-time hire makes sense.

Can you work with the product team we already have?

Yes. We can coach a junior product manager, run discovery or testing alongside your team, review the roadmap, or fill a gap while you hire. We work in your tools and rituals and write things down as we go. Your team keeps the methods and the findings after we step back.

How does your product work connect with engineering?

Every product recommendation comes with what engineering needs: a clear problem, the users it affects, a scope and a way to measure success. If you hire both suites, Roger works with Thanos on one plan. If you have your own engineers, we hand them specs and research they can build from.

What do we have in hand at the end of a product engagement?

Written outputs: research notes, a summary of what we learned, and the decisions we recommend and why. You also keep whatever the work produced, such as a roadmap, designs, a test plan or a pricing model. Each engagement ends with a handover session, so your team can carry the work on without us.

YOUR MOVE

Bring us your next decision

Tell us what you are trying to decide, build or fix. We start with your users, your evidence and your next step.

You’ll talk to Roger

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