How to develop a Minimum Viable Product (MVP)?
MVP development: a step-by-step guide
The Sannacode team helps to design profit center products for their clients. Today we decided to share a step by step algorithm for setting up a Minimum Viable Product (MVP).
1. Formulate value for users
Each product is created to solve a particular problem, and it’s not about making a profit. It requires a customer-centric approach. Why does a user need a product?
By clearly formulating the answer, you will get an idea of ​​the product’s objective and its value to the user.
2. Choose a narrow audience
Focusing on the needs of a wider audience when designing an MVP is a flawed strategy. Narrowing down the target audience allows you to target the future product more accurately. To do this, you need to formulate a portrait of an “ideal” user, a person who will buy your solution without hesitation and will be satisfied with its capabilities.
3. Analyze your competitors
Even if you develop something genuinely new, some companies are already active in your chosen industry. Their experiences, advantages, and disadvantages are worth studying carefully. Find out what their market share is, why customers come to them, and what makes them unique. You can check user reviews of your competitors and understand their strengths and weaknesses. Use this information to refine your product concept.
4. Think over the final product
The word “minimum” in the term “minimum viable product” suggests that you have a vision for the final product as a whole.
You need to define a “complete” product in the form of a long list of User Stories — this will be your product backlog.
Feasibility, cost, or other constraints should not be taken into account at this stage. We advise you to describe everything — even the most unrealistic and expensive functionality, and you can set priorities later.
Add them to your backlog at a lower priority to stay visible and useful in the right context.
Review and refine User Stories until your product is fully described. Your “complete” product backlog should include all the functionality you can think of, reflecting the needs of all the user classes you define. And all of this should be in the form of cohesive User Stories.
5. Define the main feature for the MVP
At this point, you need to build the best minimum feature set based on your full product backlog.
The minimum set of functions should solve the main problem and completely cover the user’s needs.
To pick out the main features, you need to put together a team and brainstorm. Prioritize the backlog based on the value and effort of each part.
Next, make a list of the essential features. Prioritize the list of features again and select less important ones. Repeat this until you have 1–3 features left on your list.
6. Determine the indicators of success
Before embarking on profit center development, you should define success criteria and metrics. Define KPIs and their underlying data, define and document KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) that will reflect your product’s performance over time and other measurements.
You will likely need a conversion rate funnel and a dedicated dashboard as a single, reliable benchmark for your product’s performance.
7. MVP test
MVP requires regular testing throughout development. Alpha testing is done internally by testers, but beta testing will need outside help. It’s okay if these are people from among future users. Those wishing to participate in the test can be found on BetaList, ProductHunt, Reddit, Quora, or recruited through their communication channels: social networks, blogs, and email newsletters.
The main task of testing will be the technical improvement of the MVP. Before release, the product must work without errors so that technical problems do not prevent users from evaluating its functionality.
8. Launching the MVP and getting feedback
Getting user feedback is one of the most challenging tasks. Epp store ratings and reviews will tell you something, but your goal is to get as in-depth feedbacks as possible. It is essential always to be available to your audience — create accounts on social networks, monitor forums where your target audience is located, add your contact information to the profit center and let users know that you will always be glad to hear their opinions and comments.
Keep in mind that people tend to talk more about what they don’t like than about what they want. So just because you get more negative reviews than positive reviews doesn’t mean your product is terrible.
Statistics, rather than user reviews, determine product viability. You can use special tools to track the activity of your users.
The hardest part here is to correctly interpret the results obtained and, based on this data, continue to develop your product.
Conclusion
So, you’ve developed everything and launched everything. Perhaps the most crucial advice is that if something went wrong, then maybe you should decide that this idea does not make sense to develop further. It is one of the most challenging decisions a developer can make. Still, sometimes it happens, and it is better to abandon your idea early in its development than after many months of labor. In any case, thanks to the MVP of your product and the reaction of your audience, you will learn a lot of useful information that will be useful to you in the future.
If you have a great idea and want to validate it, fill out the form below, and the Sannacode team will help you with the MVP development.
You can read the full article at the link at Sannacode blog.