Prelude

In 2010, Joel Gascoigne had an idea for a social media scheduling tool. He noticed that many individuals and businesses struggled to maintain a consistent presence across multiple platforms. Joel envisioned a solution that would allow users to schedule posts in advance, saving time and effort.

Rather than diving headfirst into building a fully-featured product, Joel decided to validate his idea through an MVP. He created a simple landing page that described the core functionality of his proposed tool, which he called Buffer. The page included a call-to-action button that said "Plans and Pricing".

Here's the twist: when visitors clicked the button, they were taken to a page that explained the product was not yet ready and asked them to leave their email address if they were interested. This clever approach allowed Joel to gauge demand without investing time and resources into development.

To Joel's surprise, enough people signed up to validate the need for his product. He quickly built a bare-bones version of Buffer, offering only the most essential scheduling features. Joel shared this MVP with his waitlist, gathering valuable feedback and iterating based on user insights.

By focusing on a core set of features and continuously improving based on real customer needs, Buffer grew into a powerful social media management platform. Today, the company serves over 75,000 customers and generates millions in annual revenue.

Buffer's story illustrates the power of starting small, validating demand, and letting customer feedback guide product development. By embracing an MVP mindset, Joel transformed his idea into a successful business.

Lesson Overview

  • Understand the importance of prototyping and MVP development in turning your business idea into reality
  • Learn how to build and refine a minimal viable product (MVP) to gather early feedback
  • Discover how iterative improvements based on customer feedback can lead to a successful product launch

What is an MVP and why is it important?

An MVP, or Minimum Viable Product, is a version of your product with just enough features to satisfy early customers and gather feedback for future development. It is a powerful tool for validating your business idea, as it allows you to:

  1. Test demand: An MVP helps you determine whether there is a market for your product without investing significant resources.
  2. Gather insights: By putting your MVP in the hands of real users, you can learn what resonates, what needs improvement, and what additional features are desired.
  3. Iterate quickly: Insights from your MVP enable you to make data-driven enhancements, ensuring you're building something customers truly want.
  4. Minimize risk: Validating with an MVP reduces the chance of spending time and money on a product no one needs.

By focusing on your core value proposition and delivering a lean solution, an MVP sets the stage for a more successful, customer-centric product.

Steps Involved in Building a Minimum Viable Product

There are many methods to building an MVP, but we find having a step-by-step structure helps to keep encapsulate what needs to be done. This image describes the steps succinctly and clearly:

Source: A Step-by-Step Guide to Building an MVP - BuzzyBrains Blog

Let’s take a deeper dive:

Let's embark on the journey of creating an MVP for a revolutionary fitness app called "FitQuest." We'll follow our brave entrepreneur as they navigate the ten steps to bring their idea to life.

  1. Define Your MVP's Goal and Scope

Imagine you're the visionary behind FitQuest, a groundbreaking fitness app. Before diving into development, it's crucial to define your MVP's objectives and scope clearly.

Using the Lean Canvas framework, you outline FitQuest's unique value proposition: helping busy professionals achieve their fitness goals through gamified, AI-personalized workouts.

You identify your target customers as health-conscious individuals aged 25-45 who struggle to find time for exercise.

Your key metrics will include daily active users and workout completion rates, and your unfair advantage lies in your proprietary AI algorithm that tailors workouts to each user's fitness level and preferences. With a clear vision in place, you're ready to embark on your MVP journey.

IdeaFloat can help you automatically generate this framework.

ideafloat.com
  1. Conduct Market Research

As the mastermind behind FitQuest, you know that thorough market research is essential to your app's success. You dive into the TAM, SAM, SOM framework to estimate your market potential.

Using tools like Google Trends and Statista, you analyze search volumes for fitness-related keywords and explore competitor offerings. You identify a gap in the market for personalized, gamified fitness solutions and determine that your serviceable obtainable market (SOM) consists of 500,000 potential users.

Armed with this valuable data, you're confident that FitQuest has the potential to capture a significant share of the fitness app market. a clear vision in place, you're ready to embark on your MVP journey.

Or, use IdeaFloat to automatically define your market size.

ideafloat.com
  1. Create a Prototype

With your market research complete, it's time to bring FitQuest to life. You embrace the power of rapid prototyping and use Figma to create clickable wireframes that showcase your app's core user flow and features.

You focus on designing an intuitive onboarding process, a personalized workout dashboard, and an engaging challenge system that motivates users to stay active. By creating a tangible representation of your vision, you can gather valuable feedback and iterate on your design before investing in full-scale development.

  1. Prioritize and Develop Core Features

As you prepare to develop FitQuest, you recognize the importance of prioritizing features for your MVP. Employing the MoSCoW method, you categorize each feature as a "must-have," "should-have," "could-have," or "won't-have."

You determine that personalized workout plans, progress tracking, and a challenge system are essential for your MVP, while features like social sharing and in-app purchases can wait for future iterations. Using Trello, you collaborate with your development team to create a prioritized backlog and ensure that your MVP stays focused on delivering maximum value to your users.

  1. Build a Minimalistic UI

With your core features defined, you turn your attention to designing FitQuest's user interface. Channeling your inner artist, you use Sketch to create a sleek, minimalistic UI that puts your users' needs front and center.

Applying the Hick-Hyman Law, you streamline navigation and minimize cognitive load, ensuring that users can easily access their personalized workouts and track their progress. By focusing on simplicity and intuitive design, you create a seamless user experience that sets FitQuest apart from the competition.

Source:Hick's Law
  1. Develop a Working Prototype

With your UI designed, it's time to bring FitQuest to life. You assemble a talented team of developers who share your passion for creating innovative fitness solutions. Using React Native, your team begins building a functional prototype that incorporates your core features and UI design.

You adopt an Agile Development approach, working in short sprints and continuously gathering feedback to refine your MVP. By developing iteratively, you can quickly adapt to changes and ensure that FitQuest meets your users' needs.

  1. Test, Iterate, and Gather Feedback

As your FitQuest prototype takes shape, it's time to put it in the hands of real users. You recruit a group of beta testers who fit your target demographic and are eager to provide feedback.

Using Typeform, you gather valuable insights into your users' experiences, while Hotjar helps you analyze their behavior within the app. You also leverage CannyHQ to manage feature requests and prioritize future improvements. By actively seeking and incorporating user feedback, you can iteratively refine FitQuest to create a truly user-centric fitness solution.

  1. Launch and Monitor

After months of hard work and iteration, FitQuest is ready for its public debut. With a mix of excitement and anticipation, you launch your MVP on the app store and begin monitoring its performance using Mixpanel.

You track key metrics like user acquisition, retention, and engagement, looking for opportunities to optimize and improve. By leveraging the power of data, you can make informed decisions that drive FitQuest's growth and success.

One good way to do this is by using Pirate Metrics: AAARRR.

Source: What is the Pirate Funnel (AAARRR) + How to apply it in 5 quick steps
  1. Analyze Feedback and Iterate

As FitQuest gains traction, user feedback starts pouring in. You diligently analyze each comment and request, looking for patterns and opportunities for improvement.

Using the RICE prioritization framework, you evaluate each potential change based on its reach, impact, confidence, and effort required. You prioritize updates that will deliver the most value to your users and align with your long-term vision for FitQuest. By continuously iterating based on user feedback, you ensure that your app remains relevant and engaging.

  1. Determine the Next Steps

With your MVP launched and iterative improvements underway, it's time to plan for FitQuest's future. You analyze your app's performance, user feedback, and market trends to determine your next steps.

Should you double down on your current features, pivot to a new focus area, or scale your operations to reach a wider audience? Canny HQ is a great tool to use here, as it helps you understand what’s working and what isn’t quickly and direct from the source. With a data-driven approach and a commitment to delivering value to your users, you chart a course for FitQuest's long-term success.

And there you have it – the thrilling tale of FitQuest's journey from idea to MVP! By following these ten steps and leveraging proven frameworks, our hero has created a product that not only solves user problems but also delights and engages. The road ahead may be filled with challenges, but armed with a robust MVP and a customer-centric mindset, they're ready to take the fitness world by storm!

Bringing It All Together

Going back to our Prelude…

Buffer's MVP journey is one of many that demonstrates the value of starting small, testing often, and letting customer insights guide development. By resisting the temptation to overbuild and instead focusing on core functionality, the company validated demand and set itself up for sustainable growth.

As you embark on your own MVP development, remember these key takeaways:

  1. Focus on your core value prop. Your MVP should address the primary user need in the simplest possible way.
  2. Gather real user insights. Put your prototype in front of target customers and seek candid feedback.
  3. Iterate quickly. Use what you learn to make rapid improvements, ensuring you're building something people want.
  4. Embrace imperfection. Your MVP is a learning tool, not the final product. Start small and refine as you go.

By taking an iterative, customer-centric approach and utilizing the right tools at each stage, you'll be well on your way to turning your business idea into a successful reality – just like Buffer did.

Further Reading

  1. MVP’s from a design perspective: Minimum Viable Product (MVP) and Design - Balancing Risk to Gain Reward
  2. "MVP: What is it and why it matters" by Atlassian: Minimum Viable Product (MVP): What is it & Why it Matters
  3. The lean startup book by Eric Ries is really the guiding light on the matter in the last few years.

Assignment

  • Define your product's core value proposition and list the essential features needed to deliver on it.
  • Spend some time to walk through the 10 steps of creating an MVP.
    • Create a low-fidelity prototype of your MVP using a tool like Figma, InVision, or even pen and paper. Focus on illustrating the primary user flow and key interactions.
  • Identify 3 potential user types in your target market and share your MVP prototype with them. Gather feedback through interviews or a short survey.
  • Based on the insights collected, outline three priority enhancements to your MVP. Bonus points for implementing these changes in your prototype.

Knowledge Check

  1. What does MVP stand for?
    1. Most Valuable Player
    2. Minimum Viable Product
    3. Most Valuable Product
  2. The primary purpose of an MVP is to:
    1. Generate maximum revenue
    2. Validate demand and gather feedback
    3. Build a perfect, feature-rich product
  3. When developing an MVP, it's most important to focus on:
    1. Advanced technology and a polished design
    2. Core functionality that solves the primary user need
    3. Including as many features as possible