Identifying Minimum Viable Products
Updated: Feb 9
“The only way to win is to learn faster than anyone else.”- Eric Ries
In the book Eric Ries' “The Lean Start-up,” says the minimum viable product is presented as a version that facilitates the highest amount of customer learning with minimal effort.
What is a Minimum Viable Product?
The Minimum Viable Product (MVP) is a simplified version of a product or service designed to test its market viability. It serves as a prototype, allowing teams to assess market response, validate assumptions, and understand product functionality. The goal is to decide whether there is a market for the product. Examples of MVPs include demo videos or software prototypes. This approach helps businesses gather feedback, minimize risks, and make informed decisions before committing extensive resources to full-scale development.
Why Build an MVP?
The rapid prototyping process is crucial for business success, focusing on ensuring the viability of ideas by delivering immediate value to address early user needs while minimizing initial development costs.
This approach facilitates the collection of valuable data on end-user behavior and preferences, offering a preview of the product's market potential. Additionally, it helps clarify future iterations and refine the product development roadmap, showcasing business potential to attract new stakeholders and investors.
Overall, rapid prototyping serves as a strategic tool to validate, optimize, and position a product for success in the market.
Identifying the MVP?
In the initial phase of our project, our focus lies on the first column of the story map, where we aim to identify the minimum set of user stories or epics necessary to meet the basic user needs. This process extends to subsequent columns horizontally, culminating in the identification of the minimum viable product (MVP), which represents the essential steps required for our project.
It's crucial to recognize that the concept of MVP goes beyond delivering the smallest functionality. Instead, it incorporates the primary criterion of gaining sufficient insights into business viability. Teams often misconstrue MVP as merely the minimum set of features, but it encompasses a strategic approach to ensure meaningful learning about the product's potential success.
Once MVPs are identified and released, the subsequent step involves actively seeking feedback from users. User feedback becomes a valuable tool in gauging the product's value and identifying areas of improvement. This iterative feedback loop is integral to shaping the ongoing development of the product.
In essence, the MVP concept, as highlighted by Eric Ries, underscores the importance of obtaining user feedback early in the development process. It aligns with the proverb, "It is better to sleep on things before-half than lie awake about them afterward," emphasizing the significance of proactive decision-making and continuous refinement based on user insights.
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