Developing a new product is an exciting but challenging process. You need to balance your vision, your resources, and your customers' needs. One way to do that is to define the minimum viable product (MVP) for your product development. But what is an MVP and how do you create one? Here are some tips to help you answer these questions.
An MVP is the simplest version of your product that can deliver value to your customers and test your core assumptions. It is not a prototype, a beta, or a final product. It is a learning tool that helps you validate your problem-solution fit and product-market fit. By building an MVP, you can avoid wasting time and money on features that your customers don't want or need.
Though MVP by its definition sounds like a product but ideally it is not. In reality, an MVP is close to a realization of a dream, as seen by different business stakeholders in an organization, on a digital platform to gauge whether the organization should continue spending time, money and efforts in grooming it with same set of resources or should look out another alternative in open market.
An MVP is essential for any product development because it allows you to test your hypotheses and learn from your customers' feedback. You can use an MVP to measure your key performance indicators (KPIs), such as user engagement, retention, conversion, and satisfaction. You can also use an MVP to identify your unique value proposition (UVP), your target market, and your competitive advantage. An MVP helps you reduce the risk of failure and increase the chances of success.
When it comes to defining an MVP, there is no one-size-fits-all formula. However, you can use some steps to guide your process. Begin with your vision and goals. Ask yourself what problem you are solving and for whom? What value are you offering and how do you measure it? Then, conduct customer research and validation. Identify your potential customers and their needs, pain points, and behaviors. Understand how they currently solve their problem and what their alternatives are. After that, prioritize your features and scope. Decide which features are essential for solving the problem and delivering value, as well as which features can be added later or eliminated. Finally, build, measure, and learn. Create a prototype or mockup of your MVP and test it with your customers. Collect and analyze data and feedback from them to iterate and improve based on your learnings.
Using the 5 Ws model is a framework to define an MVP. 1st W - WHO - Who is the user - user persona 2nd W - WHAT - What is the user going to use this product for. This requires of a thorough understanding of the problem that we are trying to solve in the market. 3rd W - WHY - Why does the user want this product. If the user uses this product how are they going to benefit from using this product. 4th WHERE - Where is the user going to use this product. In enterprise applications this requires an understanding of the ecosystem in which this product is going to fit 5th WHEN - When the user uses this product, then what will happen next. This requires an understanding of the workflow for the features of the product.
MVP can be defined as series of value oriented tasks from different work streams stitched together to realize a concept in real world. With the proper prioritization of tasks and the collaboration of stakeholders as ‘must to have’ ingredient, can make an MVP as success.
There are a variety of MVPs you can use depending on your product, market, and goals. A landing page is a web page that describes your product's value proposition and invites visitors to sign up or pre-order. A video is a short presentation that shows the product's features, functionality, and user experience. A wizard of Oz is a technique that simulates the product without actually building it. A concierge delivers your product's value proposition by providing personalized and humanized service. And a single feature focuses on building and testing one core feature that delivers the most value to customers. Each of these techniques can help test problem-solution fit, desirability, viability, customer satisfaction, retention, and loyalty.
Creating an MVP is not a one-time event, but an ongoing cycle of experimentation and learning. To help you create an effective and efficient MVP, you should define your problem, customer, and value with a problem statement, customer persona, and value proposition canvas. Validate your assumptions with real customers through interviews, surveys, experiments, or feedback tools. Prioritize your features and scope with a feature prioritization matrix, lean canvas, or user story map. Build your MVP as quickly and cheaply as possible with low-fidelity or high-fidelity prototypes, mockups, or wireframes. Measure your MVP's performance and impact with KPIs, metrics, and analytics tools. Finally, learn from your MVP's feedback and data by using the build-measure-learn loop, lean startup method, or agile methodology to iterate and improve your MVP.