For years, much of product management has been focused on building better features, refining flows, optimising conversion rates. We’ve gotten really good at it. Book a flight, taxi or hotel today and regardless of the platform, it is generally a pretty seamless experience.
Recently, I found myself having a conversation that stuck with me.
We were discussing the growth strategy for a travel booking platform - one that, on the surface, looked like many others: strong product, solid customer base, established brand. But as I probed deeper, a simple but uncomfortable question emerged:
Where does growth come from next?
In a market where virtually every competitor has access to the same inventory, the same pricing, the same search algorithms - how do you keep winning? Add that to rising competition with D2C travel influencers, social media-driven tourism, and AI-powered trip planning tools that can bypass traditional aggregators entirely. How do you sustain, let alone grow such a business model?
That’s when something clicked for me:
Maybe “the product” isn’t what matters most anymore.
For years, much of product management has been focused on building better features, refining flows, optimising conversion rates. We’ve gotten really good at it. Book a flight, taxi or hotel today and regardless of the platform, it is generally a pretty seamless experience.
The problem is: everyone’s product is pretty good now. The feature gap has closed - and once you’ve optimised the funnel and added every filter, there’s only so far you can go by tweaking the product alone.
The bigger opportunity isn’t inside the booking flow, it’s in the experience that surrounds it.
When I challenged this particular company, I offered a different perspective:
What if instead of trying to endlessly optimise the product, they leaned into becoming part of the guest’s entire holiday experience?
The product isn’t just the transaction anymore: the product is the full experience.
And frankly, that experience has far more commercial upside than simply capturing another booking. From opening up commission driven revenue streams, to leveraging the commercial value of personalisation.
In many ways, this is where I believe product management is headed.
Our role is no longer just about shipping features. We have to think more holistically about how people feel, engage, trust, and return.
As a product manager, we're mixing the roles of experience architects, journey designers, cross-functional connectors, customer psychologists and yes sometimes even ecosystem builders.
Because today, it’s not enough for the product to work. It has to live within a broader ecosystem of trust, utility, and emotional value.
Whether you’re building a consumer app, a SaaS platform, or an AI product fundamentally the same principle applies:
As AI levels the playing field for features and capabilities, experience may become the most defensible USP any product can have.
I don’t actually believe product is dead (and that certainly wouldn't be great for my career prospects). But I do believe the definition of what we call “product” is fundamentally expanding.
The most exciting PMs I know aren’t obsessing over backlogs and roadmaps, they’re asking deeper questions about how to build emotional connection, engagement, and differentiated experiences that truly matter to users.
And personally? That’s where I want to be spending my time.
If you’re thinking about this shift too, whether you’re a founder, PM, or operator - I’d love to hear how you’re approaching it.
If you’re building something ambitious, I’d love to be part of it. Reach out to chat about your next product or growth challenge.
