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Introduction

Many projects fail because they commit to big bang deliveries without assessing
whether their product is a market fit. In fact, as per a CB Insights study, about 35% of the startups fail due to “no market need” — making it one of the top reasons for startup failure, only second to “insufficient cash/capital” (38%). That’s precisely where the significance of a minimum viable product (MVP) comes into play.

What is a Minimum Viable Product (MVP)?

MVP concept has originated from agile development best practices. This approach to
product development involves the gradual evolution of a product with consideration of
customer feedback and experience. In a nutshell, a product is minimally viable when it
has minimum features that can address customer needs and project the company’s core
value proposition.
MVP is key to business success because it:
● Validates the business opportunities and mitigates prototype risk before
developing a full-fledged product.
● Defines the brand and makes a value proposition to the current and potential
users.
● Helps draw potential investors and raise future funds that result in increased
scalability and revenue opportunities.

Categories of MVP

Low-Fidelity
A low-fidelity MVP checks the availability of customers willing to purchase the product
or services in the future. It helps gain a better understanding of the audience’s problems
and examine how a valuable solution can benefit potential users.
Some common low-fidelity MVPs include blogs, explainer videos, presentations, surveys,
questionnaires, forums, and communities.

High-Fidelity
A high-fidelity MVP is more complex and requires in-depth analysis to provide empirical
data. It aims to understand the willingness of customers to pay for the product, segment
the target audience, and test product adoption.
Some common high-fidelity MVPs include digital prototypes, 3D models, pre-orders, and
crowdfunding.

Types of MVP

Concierge MVPs

It helps your users accomplish their goals while validating future offerings. In essence,
Concierge MVP is an instrumental technique to test the critical business question: “does
the customer want what you are building?”.
As such, it’s a valuable tool to understand if users are interested in the business idea
without writing a single line of code or using costly technological interventions.
Advantages
● Establish contact with prospects and evaluate their feedback.
● Learn about the product’s viability very early in the process.
● Interact with customers in the place where the product is being used. Favorably,
Concierge MVP yields the opportunity for ethnographic interaction.
Disadvantages
● The result of concierge MVP may not be completely accurate as it is a personal
service delivered by an individual. Individual choices can also introduce bias in
the results.
● Requires another set of lean cycles before building the product.

Wizard of Oz MVP

Wizard of Oz MVPs have specific tasks conducted by humans to mimic the mature
system. This MVP provides a specific impression of the solution from the outside.
In one way, Wizard of Oz MVP looks like a fully functional system, but the tasks that
automated systems should have automated are, in reality, completed by humans.
Advantages
● It is cheaper to mimic the functioning of the system.
● The results of this MVP are generated from user interactions with a system. This
data is less prone to biases as compared to the subjectiveness exhibited by
Concierge MVP.
● There is a more reasonable possibility to see the behavior of a mature system.
While algorithms can take years to build the product, this MVP can get feedback
within a few weeks.
Disadvantages
● It requires humans to do all the jobs behind the scenes. Typically, this works well
if the leadership has domain expertise, but finding others with similar knowledge
can be very challenging.

Landing Page MVP

This MVP illustrates the benefits of using the product or service. A landing page is very
effective as it describes the product or service on a single page. Favorably, it contains a
button that allows interested visitors to click to join a mailing list, read more, buy now,
or any other specific action.
Advantages
● Provides a clear product description and elucidates its unique selling
proposition. Ergo, it helps customers resonate with the brand early in the
process.
● Easy to analyze the customer performance by using multiple landing pages.
● Capture the email addresses of prospects to take follow up in the future.
● Landing pages can be created in significantly less time.
Disadvantages
● The actual buying of a product or service cannot happen; it just provides an email
address to register their interest.
● It’s hard to realize objectivity to decipher why potential users are not clicking on
the desired call-to-action.

Email MVP

Email is a great way to learn about customer interests quickly. It can help you
understand the critical features required by the customers while building the product.
Besides, creating an email MVP takes significantly less effort and time. If there are
existing customers, emails can be created manually to see the response.
Advantages
● Low overhead cost and allows the business to take time to test the feasibility of
the idea.
● A variety of tools like Mailchimp can be used to execute this MVP.
● Produces better results than social media with a better return on investment.
Disadvantages
● Requires the creation of a list of recipients that can be potential customers.
● Difficult to turn subscribers or potential users into customers.

Choose Your MVP Wisely

If you are tempted with any one of these MVPs and feel like jumping right to the execution, stop here. Unless you are completely sure about your needs to achieve with this experiment, it is most likely to fail. So, choose your MVPs wisely.

While every MVP varies greatly in context to the effort and time entailed, it would be best if a business employs different types of MVP for various areas of the development plan. This can help create a successful combination of multiple MVPs to fine-tune the development strategy.

Upon sensing the product’s viability, a business can quickly proceed with building the core functionalities to create a featured MVP. Since this is the first seed of your project, it is essential to pick the right partner to help your product grow strong. Contact Us to get started with the right approach to development.

Nitin
Nitin Tappe

After successful stint in a corporate role, Nitin is back to what he enjoys most – conceptualizing new software solutions to solve business problems. Nitin is a postgraduate from IIT, Mumbai, India and in his 24 years of career, has played key roles in building a desktop as well as enterprise solutions right from idealization to launch which are adopted by many Fortune 500 companies. As a Founder member of Pratiti Technologies, he is committed to applying his management learning as well as the passion for building new solutions to realize your innovation with certainty.

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