What is a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) and how does it help validate product-market fit?

In the healthcare-Hospital sector, defining an 'MVP' – or 'Minimum Viable Product' – hinges primarily on its safety and reliability, particularly its readiness for human testing without causing harm. Beyond basic safety, an MVP must demonstrate a degree of efficacy, showcasing that it can meet the minimum expectations for a new product in its target market. It's also crucial that MVPs are backed by a robust development plan which is in line with stringent quality standards and regulatory requirements. This ensures that the product is not only viable but also primed for successful integration and acceptance in the healthcare industry.

A Minimum Viable Product is a version of your product that has the least amount of features needed to engage early adopters into it so that you can learn and grow (or pivot). Ask yourself: will people buy it? Although you can distribute your MVP for free, it's a much better metric to measure if your MVP is valuable enough so that people are willing to spend money on it. Use the MVP to evaluate if a scalable business can be built around your product for this market. Use lean startup principles and learn, build, test and measure as fast as you can and as many times as needed. Pivot when you find users are not willing to spent on or engage with your product.

IS the initial and simplified version of a product which includes only the essential features to validate the idea and get feedback from users. IS NOT a functionality broken into parts.

In essence, an MVP is a strategic tool for efficiently testing, learning, and iterating in the market, aligning product development with market needs, and reducing the uncertainties of launching new ventures. -> It is a cost/time-effective way to de-risk a new venture.

In my experience, MVP stands for Minimum Viable Product, a version of the product with just enough features to gather feedback. -It provides early data that helps understand user interest in your product. -Positive results give the green light to develop the full version, saving time and resources while being appealing to potential users. -Trends and insights, especially user retention data, can provide an advantage when developing the full version of the product. -Acquiring early adopters and building a potential customer base is facilitated, and it is less expensive than developing a product with more features that increase costs and the risk of failure.

Eric Ries, long before writing "The Lean Startup", co-founded IMVU, a startup building 3D avatars for social networking platforms, yet to prove its metal. Before the product launch, they spent six months coding away potential problems, paranoid about issues like server crash. However, nobody downloaded it even for free. What bothered Eric was not the fact that they had got the product wrong, but how much time and effort was wasted building something nobody wanted, on the wrong assumption that customers would behave the way they predicted. How could they have found out that their assumption was wrong sooner? That is when Eric came up with the concept of the MVP, that enables you to test your assumptions as early as possible.

Crafting an MVP is like having a personal guide testing with a specific customer group unveils insights efficiently. . Swiftly learn what matters, refine your product's essence, and shape a compelling value. . Early adopters become partners, offering personal feedback, heartfelt testimonials, and fostering a loyal community. . It's not just a product; it's a shared journey.

I've seen many companies build entire businesses, create extensive apps, and develop large websites, only to spend years discovering that customers don't need such products, they are solving the wrong problems, or the timing is not right. You need an MVP to quickly test the market and decide whether to persevere or pivot based on customer feedback.

Again, I have come to view this as a necessary step in prototypes (often referred to as "Beta") but not something that I think should launch. If this approach is followed then both the "Why we need an MVP" as well as "What is the development and business plan to move to the full product?" should be carefully considered. I agree that for many products there is a large amount of usability and workflow feedback that is needed but I really hesitate to actually attempt to market an MVP. The potential risks of an MVP not meeting validation and/or value expectations need to be considered.

It is important to not complicate your MVP with the nice-to-have features and view it from the lens of entire product development. It is important to look at it as a process that enables you to get the bare-bones version of your product to users at the earliest, get their feedback, and act on it. The key is focusing on just the essential features to get your product in users' hands at the earliest, and not chase perfection to lead your product to a dead end, where you can't act on user feedback.

There is no "one answer" on how to create an MVP. It depends on what your product is and how your users are willing to use it. However, you should always identify assumptions, hypotheses, and risks beforehand. A good way to start is with a Value Proposition Canvas. Now, for creating the MVP, consider these options: - Do it manually: If you can deliver the value or check if someone will pay for a service just by doing it without building anything, then just do it. - Run a survey: So you can check for the rate of people interested. - Create a landing page: See if people will be interested enough in your product to subscribe. - Use a no(or low)-code / white label solution: Build a temporary version and see if you get traction and retention.

There is no definitive right or wrong way to create an MVP, but my recommendation is to lay a solid foundation. Relying on various no-code solutions and non-scalable systems might become problematic if your MVP turns out to be an interesting product for your customers. Try to find a technical co-founder or aim to win some grants so you can build an MVP that not only tests the market quickly but can also scale effectively if it performs well.

If you've created an MVP and got users into it, now it's time to check if it's going toward a true market need, which means it has Product-Market Fit. Arm yourself with data and information: collect usage data; monitor KPIs; talk to users about your product; conduct surveys; and apply PMF tests. Your goal is to either confirm the product is economically viable or know which way to pivot as fast as possible. Use the Lean Startup principle of small increments of work and validation, so prioritize features by most impact and least effort to make iterations efficient. If you are going the right way, use the MoSCoW prioritization method: it stands for “must-have,” “should-have,” “could-have,” and “won’t-have.”

Develop your MVP rapidly and deliver it to your early adopter customers. If the majority likes it, then you're on the right track. However, if you notice a clear decline in usage or interest, then you need to reassess. If everything goes well, consider applying for funding, growing your team, and continually testing each step of your development by showcasing your product to the customer.

1. Usage Data: DAU offers insights into how indispensable your product is to customers. 2. User Base Metrics: NPS, growth, retention, and churn rates provide a snapshot of customer satisfaction, loyalty, and how attracted they are to your offer. 3. Financial Metrics: Comparing CAC with LTV helps assess profitability and sustainability. 4. Customer Interviews or Surveys: Direct feedback can reveal how well your product meets user needs. 5. The Sean Ellis Test: Ask users how disappointed they would be if they could no longer use your product. A +40% rate of strong disappointment suggests a strong PMF. 6. The David Cummings Test: Satisfy the 5-criteria checklist and you probably have PMF. Especially good for small B2B client bases.

From my experience, founders instantly recognize when they have achieved product-market fit (PMF). To describe the feeling, it's like seeing your customers quickly grasp the concept and show readiness to integrate, use, and pay for the product. When you observe this, you know you've hit the mark.

In my experience the "MVP" approach is best suited for prototypes. These should be carefully defined as subsets of the complete product requirements so everyone understands what has been left out to allow early user testing. However, trying to go to market with MVP hardware has always been a mistake when the company needs to deal with unhappy early adopters who "need to buy the latest version to get fully featured system". This type of scenario can damage a company/brand a lot more than launching a platform that has appropriate lifespan to meet market expectations.

Developing an MVP involves a personal journey that involves close collaboration with a specific group, in-depth learning, and producing a memorable experience. Early adopters share insights beyond feedback and leave a personal legacy; they are more than simply users in this journey; they are like friends.