How can you evaluate whether or not your business concept is viable? The solution is to develop your product’s MVP or Minimum Viable Product. This is, however, only half of the battle. Companies frequently overlook MVP testing strategies and validate MVP while focusing on MVP.
The product must start with one test level and then progress to the next to obtain customer validation and assess the product’s usability. However, this testing can help develop a viable minimal viable product while still accounting for budget limitations. As a result, merely creating an MVP is not good enough; testing an MVP with a test strategy is also essential.
A firm may believe that the product can meet consumer demands, but it can’t be stated with certainty until after the MVP tests. However, this blog post will explore seven time-tested strategies for MVP testing. These MVP testing strategies will help you create a successful MVP test and ensure that your product is ready for market.
What You Should Know About Minimum Viable Product
An MVP (minimum viable product) is the first version of your product intended to assess the market’s reaction to your business concept. MVP implies rapid development and low implementation expenses. MVP (minimum viable product) originated in Lean Startup, a method for rapid product development.
Instead of investing years in developing a complicated application that may fail, the technique suggests building software to evaluate target customers’ needs. In the context of software development, MVP means creating a simple product without first developing the final version.
The creation of an MVP was used by giants such as Twitter, Instagram, and Spotify to start. It’s a full-fledged program with basic features. It’s essential to limit the focus of your MVP to the basic features since, without them, the product would not be possible. By developing an MVP, a firm may experiment with various methods for further development.
By developing a MVP, a firm may experiment with various methods for further development
Why Is It Necessary to Test the MVP?
It’s a big gamble to release a product on the market without first testing it. The test results of a minimum viable product and the customer feedback can assist you in determining whether or not it’s worth continuing with the project. The following is the result you’ll get after testing your MVP:
- changes in the testing approach that should be considered
- appropriate decisions about the current product
- fewer mistakes
- product enhancement
- it reduces costs in comparison with a full-fledged product launch
7 Best Ways to Test an MVP
Building a minimum viable product is undoubtedly an essential process. But after you get the finished product, it’s too early to stop. The next critical step is launching and evaluating the product.
Testing aims to understand how a business idea meets the market’s needs and how you can further develop your product. Steps to validating an MVP differ depending on its type and business needs. But the following are the main approaches to assessing the demand for the product.
1. Customer Interviews
Customer interviews are a treasure trove of valuable data. They can assist you in obtaining insights from your actual customers about your MVP that may not be feasible to collect otherwise. As a result, there is no better approach to evaluate an MVP than to ask those who will be using it.
Customer interviews can help you discover what challenges your target audience faces and whether your actual product addresses them. Furthermore, they offer the opportunity to show customers the value of your product.
Another advantage of customer interviews for MVP validation is that you may anticipate honest comments from them. Customers may lie, sugarcoat, or provide fake reviews when writing their thoughts about products online. But, there is a greater possibility that they will give honest feedback.
However, to get the most out of customer surveys, collect a database of possible users online and offer them an opportunity to test your MVP. Then, list all the problems you believe your customers may encounter. After completing it, ask each client how they’d rate the issues and whether your MVP addresses them.
Take notes on every feedback you get. You’ll be astonished at what you find. The following are a few things to bear in mind:
- Begin the interview on a lighter note and then gradually get more detailed
- Set up all the assumptions that you think may exist and get honest feedback on them
- Avoid making statements like “our product is a marketing-free MVP” while discussing the MVP. It will help if you concentrate on communicating value instead.
You may also survey to find out whether your product met the needs of your intended consumers and what they’d want to see in the future. The chances are that the client isn’t concerned about situations that don’t appear to be critical. However, you will have enough valuable information to create a higher-quality product.
2. Landing Pages
Buffer, the well-known social media platform, began as a simple landing page—actually two. The first page provided information about the product, and the second was a signup page. That’s all Joel Gascoigne, the company’s co-founder, did to validate his MVP.
Landing pages are a popular option for testing an MVP. A landing page can be used to see whether your MVP appeals to your target audience. It can also tell you whether your product is appealing to certain buyer types, which may be helpful if you have multiple options and are unsure about how to reach out.
You could find a new treasure trove of possibilities through an MVP landing page. Landing pages are considered a means to collect the email addresses of potential customers. But landing pages are so much more than that. Even though landing pages are pretty famous, not many up-and-coming businesses use them to their full potential.
Landing pages can provide you with a treasure trove of information. For example, you may test out a few different landing page versions. The arrangements could be displayed in various ways depending on the combination, from design to features and pricing models.
You’re now going to compare the popularity of various versions based on how many and what sort of individuals sign up for them, allowing you to evaluate how viable a solution your MVP is and which type of people it appeals to most. For an influential gathering of all-important traffic and signup data, Google Analytics can handle the job.
3. Ad Campaigns
An ad campaign may be a comprehensive market research instrument if you know how to employ them correctly. Ad campaigns on social networking sites, like landing pages, can also give you valuable analytics. Nevertheless, the type of analysis you receive through an ad campaign is quite sophisticated.
Ad campaigns allow you to take full advantage of your buyer persona developed for your MVP in the early phases. Ad campaigns let you target your MVP to specific parts of the audience you want to engage. You may target your advertisements to people based on their gender, region, age group, and even your targets’ interests.
In addition, an ad campaign allows you to A/B test your MVP. You may run different ad campaigns for different target audiences. You may also choose to develop advertising that highlights various MVP elements to determine what appeals most to your target audience.
4. Manual-first MVPs
Another functional MVP testing approach is to create a manual-first MVP (also known as the Wizard of Oz) that appears to be fully functional. You deliver the product/service manually when the customer purchases it. The user is given exactly what they want and believe they receive, while the actual effort is behind the scenes.
The most significant part about Manual-first MVPs is that they allow you to test your MVP on several levels with a bit of investment. Furthermore, you may check to see if your MVP validates any preconceptions you may have about it and whether or not your product can satisfy consumers’ issues.
ZeroCater is an example of a Manual-first MVP test. Arram Sabeti (founder of ZeroCater), the entrepreneur who started with a large spreadsheet to track firms and caterers he could interact with, began his business by creating a list of contacts.
Zappos began in the same way. To determine the demand for internet stores, Nick Swinmurn, the creator of Zappos, put up photographs of local businesses on a website. Nick would return to the store when someone placed an order for shoes over the internet, picked them up, and delivered them.
It was a way for him to determine whether there was a demand for online shoe shopping before investing in infrastructure and inventory. It’s no surprise that Zappos was so successful that Amazon paid $1.2 billion for it in 2009.
5. Piecemeal MVPs
Piecemeal MVPs – a combination of Wizard of Oz and Concierge tactics – is the process of developing a demo for your product using the existing tools. Rather than attempting to create an application from the ground up, utilize existing platforms and services to make an MVP.
The most notable example of a piecemeal MVP is Groupon. The first version of Groupon was developed on WordPress, Apple Mail, and an AppleScript that manually generated PDFs as orders were received from the site. As a result, the time and money necessary to create an MVP turned out to be less than anticipated.
6. Digital Prototyping
Digital Prototypes are an excellent method to examine your MVP. You may demonstrate how your product will function in real-world situations by generating mock-ups, wireframes, and prototypes. You may use them to illustrate the product’s appeal to potential consumers and verify the user experience.
Numerous digital prototypes range from simple screenshot previews and low-fidelity sketches to dummy applications that try to replicate the user experience. For this purpose, you may utilize tools such as Figma, InvisionApp, and MarvelApp.
7. Single-feature MVPs
It’s sometimes more efficient to focus on a single feature during MVP testing than several features. It can aid in the MVP development process speed and assist you in narrowing down your customer base.
Also, customers are more likely to spend their time on a single-feature MVP since it allows them to concentrate solely on the product’s primary goal. That’s why Single-feature is one of the most efficient and effective methods for MVP testing.
Foursquare did the same for their MVPs. Instead of inundating users with many features, they started by allowing users to check in to the social network via their location.
There Are a Few More MVP Testing Techniques to Try
The approaches described above are some of the best MVP testing techniques. However, there are additional methods for testing MVP that you might try:
- Examine your competitors’ products to discover what features your MVP lacks and how you can set yourself apart
- To evaluate your MVP, use tools such as OpenHallway, QuickMVP, and Five-second test
- Run a PPC campaign to assess the progress of your MVPs and user interest
- To engage with your audience and gauge their reaction, use SaaS and PaaS platforms to interact with them
- Create a paper prototype of your MVP to understand the user experience better. It’s beneficial in physical goods, such as mobile phones.
Getting Out the Door
In some cases, developing an MVP adds to the workload since it entails a lot of investment in time and effort. When creating MVPs, it is essential not to get caught up in unimportant details and overhead.
The goal is to determine if the time and effort you’re putting in are worthwhile after some time, and you don’t want to waste your time on something that users won’t find helpful or pay for. Also, it’s critical to note that when you’re testing your hypotheses, you may want to use a variety of MVP testing approaches.
The one that is best for your company’s strategy and the market will, without a doubt, vary. The critical point to remember is that you should go out and create it. Consider the most significant assumption your product makes and create a good minimum viable product (MVP) that tests it in the market.
FAQs
Why Is MVP Testing Necessary?
MVP testing allows you to test your business concept for viability and establish its market potential before putting it into action. If you do this, you will save time and resources in finding the incorrect solution.
How Can I Tell Whether My MVP Is a Success?
You may assess the success of your MVP throughout the product testing process by tracking many MVP success indicators, including:
- The total number of people who registered
- The number of individuals who placed their orders for your product before it was available
- Customer acquisition cost
- The average revenue per user
- Number of active users on your MVP blog posts
- Market share
- Positive feedback from users during the interview
- The amount raised in crowdfunding initiatives
MVP testing allows you to test your business concept for viability and establish its market potential before putting it into action. If you do this, you will save time and resources in finding the incorrect solution.
What if My MVP Fails During Testing?
Even if your MVP isn’t a success, you’ll be able to gather enough customer input to help you transition it into something that the market desires. You may use the collected data to alter your perspective and release a better market product.
What Are Some of the Most Common MVP Errors to Avoid?
- Not conducting market research
- Choosing the wrong development team
- Skipping the MVP validation and testing process
- Using the wrong audience to test your MVP
- Not considering the statistics and user feedback
