Don’t Blame the MVP

As organizations seek new ways to grow revenue, create operational efficiencies, and engender customer loyalty and satisfaction, new and refined digital experiences will inevitably occur. A question of what and how much to build will always come up as a part of this pursuit, whether it is for a new product feature on an existing product, or a whole new product.

There is a risk of building too much without good customer feedback. Even getting customers to sign off on new designs and taking them through product walk-throughs isn’t enough to justify ambitious builds. This is the reason so many modern organizations will not embark on a complicated build without building a minimum viable product first (MVP).

The Minimum Viable Product (MVP), however, is sometimes assigned to roles it was never meant to perform. In doing this it gets blamed for the failure, or even absence of other meaningful early-stage actors.

MVPs are frequently confused with two other early-stage actors (or tools)—the proof of concept (POC) and the prototype. Each has its own valuable purpose and timing. They are all three about validation, although they enter the process in different stages of validation. Let’s look at a brief definition of each:

POC – Feasibility of Idea. Testing key hypotheses and validating fundamental assumptions.

Prototype – Simulating the product. It validates pain points and test drives user’s experience through a simulated product. A further step of validation.

MVP – A functional product with enough features to attract early-adopters and further validate the product and its core features.

Throughout the story arc of a product’s development journey, you are evaluating or validating a “fit.” No one wants to build a product that no one needs, or in a way that they would not use it, so getting the right fit is crucial. There is a “progressing” of proof, if you will, that is required to justify the next stage in the progression.

In the earliest stages of a product or feature life cycle, you are trying to determine if there are sufficient customers with a problem worth solving. In other words, would they pay to have the problem taken away? This is called customer-problem fit. Once you have determined that the hypothetical problem truly exists and customers seemingly would pay to have it resolved, you are now trying to determine a solution to the problem. This is called problem-solution fit. Then finally, once the solution is designed and tested, you need to see if the marketplace will truly buy it. This is considered product-market fit.

Understanding how each tool fits in the validation process is important.  A proof-of-concept can be as simple as presenting a slide deck to representative customers to see if they have this pain. You are just trying to get to the crux of the problem and validate that there is enough of it to make it worth solving—monetizable.

Having had the pain validated, you can develop a prototype, sometimes seen as a forerunner to the MVP. Its purpose is to see if the way you plan to address the pain resonates with the customers. You want to do this before too much design and development are completed.

Finally, when you know you have nailed the pain, and the solution approach, you can create an MVP version of the product (or feature) to take to market and to get early-stage customer feedback before you dive headlong into getting to a robust version.

The MVP is something small but meaningful (working), as opposed to the prior items (POC and prototype). It has teeth to it. It has the greatest chance of getting true validation because it is a full dress rehearsal of a product that could have a long and valuable run in the marketplace. The MVP is most commonly defined as the smallest viable version of a product that delivers customer value and gives room for customer feedback.

Regardless of where you may be in your digital product journey, Experis is able to join you and help you reach your objective. Experis can help with a POC, a prototype, or even the building of your MVP. We bring experience, expertise and capacity to your digital product journey.