According to the global startup ecosystem report, startups face a high failure rate of 90% [1]. Though there are several reasons why startups fail, the most common reason is: lack of market need. As per CB insights [2], in 42% of cases, failed startups create a product or service that does not address a genuine market need. Cold statistics like this aim to inspire, not discourage, entrepreneurs to work more efficiently.
Building products without checking if people want them poses significant risks for startups. Hence, validating your idea with MVP becomes crucial. This strategic approach helps eliminate the risks of developing products without a clear market idea. To help, we have put together an 8-step minimum viable product checklist in the following blog. This checklist can help you through the process of building your MVP. But before we jump onto the checklist, let us look at the basics of MVPs.
Understanding MVP and its relevance
Coined initially by Eric Ries and Steven Blank in the lean startup concept, the term “Minimum Viable Product” refers to that version of a new product that allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort.
Why does MVP matter?
Well, for startups, it is a low-risk strategic approach to validate future product success in agile product development. The MVP approach is like a cycle: build something simple, measure how it is doing and learn from it. This critical feedback loop helps startups to quickly identify any shortcomings in their product and make necessary improvements to find product-market fit.
The main goal of an MVP is to provide immediate value, gather data, feedback for future improvements, and keep development costs low. This iterative, agile process also offers other benefits such as:
- Getting your product to the market fast.
- Testing your idea with real users before spending a large amount on complete development.
- Understanding what your target customers like or do not like.
- Testing product features to see what fits the market demographic the most.
In simple terms, an MVP includes the most basic features that make a product work. To better understand this, let us look at some minimum viable product examples.
Amazon
Founder of Amazon.com, Jeff Bezos, vision was to build a massive online shop that sold everything. Recognizing challenges like limited web users, no global supply chain, and people’s uncertainty about online shopping safety, he and his team decided to limit their scope.
They evaluated the market by shortening the list to five items, with books being the chosen category. The first version of Amazon was basic: A website, a list of books, and Jeff managing the orders himself. That was it – the Amazon MVP. As the website started to earn them money and get them customers, it showed that people were ready to shop online. This small beginning set the stage for Amazon to become the giant it is today.
Let’s now talk about another successful example- Amplify.ai, an AI-powered product that we worked on. Together, we played an important role in turning the founders’ idea into a market-fit product.
Amplify.ai
The founders of Amplify.ai had a vision of improving brand engagement with customers by using social media channels. While the initial product grabbed attention, brands wanted more features to make it worthwhile. So, we together kept improving the product using the MVP approach to find the best fit.
To make sure their idea worked in different markets, we made some changes, adapting the product for a wider group of customers. Once they found the right fit and people loved it, they got support from investors and even witnessed a successful acquisition.
If you are curious about our journey with Amplify.ai, check out the detailed case study here: Achieving Product-Market-Fit the Lean Way.
Preliminary considerations before starting MVP development
Developing an MVP begins by understanding why your product should exist. There are a few questions you should always ask yourself before starting your MVP development.
- Are you addressing a unique and significant problem?
- Are people already trying to solve this problem in a unique way?
- Do you have the best team to solve this problem and build the product well?
If your answer is yes, then you are on the right track to begin MVP development.
Identifying core functionality
Once you have identified a significant problem and know how you can solve it, it is time to consider how your product can make a real difference for users. You can ask yourself if your product can simplify complex tasks or can it improve productivity/efficiency or perform other functionality.
By clearly defining your product’s core functionality, you can clearly communicate its value to users and set it apart from existing solutions. But achieving this requires keeping your MVP’s scope focused on delivering the core value.
Conducting market research
Market research is like getting to know your target audience and their needs. It helps businesses to gain a deeper understanding of market dynamics, industry trends, customer behavior, and competitors.
You can gather this information in two ways: via primary research (direct data collection: F2F interviews, market survey, etc.) or via secondary research (existing data: industry reports, libraries, etc.). The goal is to gather relevant information that helps make better decisions and ensures the product fits as per the needs and preferences of the target market.
Performing competitive analysis
During market research, you will likely find information about your competitors. But still, it is beneficial to conduct a competitive set analysis. For that you can start by identifying competitors offering similar services or having the same product. You can also find them through market reports, review sites such a clutch or G2, and even on social media like LinkedIn.
After identifying them, it’s time to analyze them. Do a SWOT analysis – identify what you are good at, your weakness, what makes you unique and where your competitors excel. This research will help you plan and create your MVP step by step.
Talentica’s 8- step minimum viable product checklist
Creating a market-worthy idea takes time, but a minimum viable checklist can simplify the process. Building your own MVP becomes easy when you know the right steps. So, let us jump into it and make your minimum viable product creation easy!
Validate your idea
Don’t start building your product immediately; first, check and ensure there is a demand for it. It is an important step for startups, and they should prioritize it before building an MVP to avoid wasting resources on something the market doesn’t need.
Here’s how you can do it: Share your ideas with potential customers and gather critical feedback to check whether they need a product like yours at all. For example, if you are thinking of developing a new SAAS application for people who love fitness, reach out to them, convey your idea. Ask what they think about the idea, how we can make it better, and are they ready to pay for that application.
You can also gather specific user feedback using online communities like fitness forums, social media platforms like Quora and LinkedIn to validate your idea. Once you have the necessary insights and hear positive responses from your users, go ahead, and start building your fitness app with confidence.
Choose the right technology stack
Choosing the right technology stack is crucial for building, testing, deploying, and maintaining consistency of software experience. To find out the ideal stack for your MVP; firstly, you need to figure out what features and functionalities your product demands. Consider factors like scalability, development time and your teams’ expertise.
Research about successful products in similar areas and analyze what technology they have used; the difference it is making and the impact it is having on customers. This will help you understand what might work for you based on its previous success.
Also, choose a tech stack based on your project size- small, medium, or large since choice of technology stack can vary. Opt for popular options like MERN, MEVN, MEAN, serverless, PERN, LAMP, and Ruby on Rails for creating websites and web applications. Don’t go for rare technology with scarce talent; stay updated with popular trends and latest tech stacks within user communities. This approach will make sure your project has a solid foundation.
Focus on user experience
Building a user-centric product involves putting yourself in the shoes of different users. Remember you are building a product for users; hence satisfying their needs and wants is your top priority. To do this, you can do research to identify user types, investigate each users’ perspective and understand how they will be using your product.
You can also think about the goal a user would have- whether it’s buying, searching, or ordering something- and consider what they feel during these stages. This will help you to figure out the initial features for the first version of the product that matter most to users, making sure it hits the right notes from the start.
Adopt an agile development method
Agile is a quick way that can get your product into user’s hands by focusing on what they truly need. Although there are different approaches to product development, like waterfall and DevOps, the agile approach excels in developing MVPs better than the rest.
Other approaches aim to create an ideal product packet with many features, but they often fail when they hit the market because users only want a few. Agile on the other hand keeps it simple, focusing on core features received via customers’ feedback. This saves time and resources, making solutions reach users faster.
With Agile, you can make rapid iterations, break development process into small steps with specific goals. It also facilitates collaborations among teams and streamlines the entire development process. Hence, adopting an agile development process is a smart and efficient way to create apps that users really want.
Set a realistic Budget
Creating an MVP costs less than the complete product development but it still comes with a hefty price tag. If your goals and budget don’t match, creating a product becomes challenging. Moreover, if your business idea is not executed properly, your product will automatically fail. This is why your product’s cost, features and quality must work together in tandem with the MVP development.
In-house development is a choice that certain founders make. Although it offers certain perks like good communication and relationships there are also some disadvantages. One of the major disadvantages is the cost. So, if you are on a tight budget, hiring MVP development services is the best option.
Additionally, an experienced tech partner can add valuable insights from past MVP developments, which are especially beneficial if you lack a dedicated CTO or are a first-time founder.
Ensure legal and compliance standards
Compliance with laws and regulations keeps individuals and businesses away from fines and legal consequences. For example, not following data protection laws, like GDPR in the European Union, can lead you to trouble and can ask you to pay huge fines.
Following legal and compliance standards shows you are ethical and responsible, fostering trust among customers, investors, employees, and regulators. A good reputation makes your brand more valuable and opens more business opportunities.
Test and iterate
Test the MVP thoroughly to identify and fix bugs, glitches, or any issues. Carry out usability tests with real users to see how they interact with the product and find areas for improvement. Make sure your MVP handles expected loads and works well under different scenarios.
Consider offering early access or a beta version to a small group of users to gather additional feedback. Use these insights from user feedback and data to make smart decisions and keep improving the product over time.
Plan for post –MVP development
The post -MVP process is not an easy one. The journey from first product launch to achieving product- market fit post – it is a long way. Planning a successful growth strategy means you should have financial liquidity and the right team to scale the product effectively and meet customer preferences.
Keep yourself focused and plan how you can constantly innovate and enhance the product, add new features, and improve overall user experience in response to their feedback and market demands.
Post -MVP: Next steps
After building and launching your MVP, it is essential to gather user feedback and validate your market. Since you built the MVP with just enough features for early users, their feedback is vital for future product development.
Let us go over the things to focus on once your initial product version is available to users.
Analyzing MVP performance and user data
It is necessary to learn from what has been delivered, analyze it, and compare your conclusions with real market responses. In other words:
- Check what your product has become on the market.
- Analyze how the product is performing and what impact it is having.
- Compare your results with user’s opinions and adjust if needed.
This step is important to ensure your conclusions match the actual results, so take a closer look at the overall performance of the minimum marketable product and how successful your product has been so far.
Planning for scaling up
The post MVP stage involves scaling up your digital product to meet the growing user base and their evolving needs.
However, this is not easy. You need to not only enhance the product but also adapt to the entire business strategy. To do this successfully, focus on your core strategy, stick to your project vision, set up efficient processes, and have a skilled tech team on board.
This way, you’ll be able to meet your users’ needs and acquire new customers.
Adding features based on feedback
Quantitative analytics and research provide you with user feedback through which you can determine which new features are most important. You can then make changes to the product and test it again. This approach ensures that your product not only succeeds but keeps improving over time with the flexibility it needs.
Conclusion
Building an MVP is an easy way to enter the market and build customer trust. By providing value and continuously improving your product, you can differentiate yourself within the market. The above article focuses on the importance of understanding that MVP is a process and provides a helpful checklist for entrepreneurs to make it easier. It does not matter if you have a basic idea or a documented prototype; you can always consider an MVP development company.
At Talentica, we have a proven track record of building 180+ tech products for startups over the last 20 years. We help startups and businesses choose technology, set up the right architecture, and use emerging tools and trends, all while keeping the product vision intact.
Want to develop MVP but need help figuring out where to start? Reach out to us! Let us start this journey together.
FAQs about MVP Development
In which stage is a minimum viable product (MVP) created?
When creating a new product, the MVP is like a test version, and it is built during the 3rd stage of the six- step product development process, specifically the prototyping stage.
What is the purpose of a minimum viable product?
The primary purpose of the MVP is to check if the initial idea about the product is right by using real-life data. Also, it helps save time and money by launching the product faster while improving the product along the way.
How do you build a minimum viable product?
To build an MVP, follow five steps:
- Do market research.
- Set goals and identify your target users.
- Pick features and functions that matter most to the users.
- Developing MVP.
- Get feedback from users and analyze the results.
What comes after a minimum viable product?
After the MVP, the next step is to build a Minimum Marketable Product or MMP.
What are the requirements of a minimum viable product?
The key requirement for an MVP is to focus on core functionality that solves real market problems.
What should an MVP include?
An MVP should include these three key parts:
- Understanding users
- Having a basic set of core features
- A Feedback loop for gathering and acting on user feedback.
