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CREATING JOBS CHANGING LIVES
Next-Generation Fellowship Program
Build Your MVP
[Link]
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Overview of the
program and your
learning journey over
the 14 weeks:
CONCEPTS
● What is an MLP ?
● What’s the difference between MLP and MVP ?
● How to build an MLP?
● What are the different types MLP that you can
build?
By the end of the week, you will be able to:
● Comprehend the difference between MLP and MVP
● Identify the different types of MLP
● Build your own MLP
● TakeyourMLPto market
Steps:
1. Create / Iterate your MVP
2. Catapult it to MLP
3. Test the MLP
4. Complete the Feedback Loop
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Introductionto
MVP MLP Testing Feedback
MinimumViable Product
It’s commonly believed that the top two reasons startups fail is because
“there’s no market need” and “they ran out of cash.” These reasons are mental
gymnastics to avoid a plain truth: startups fail when they don’t build a
simple solutionto a problem many people have.
Steve Blanc
MVP as that version of a new product which allows a team to collect the
maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least
effort.
– Eric Ries, Lean Start-up
It is a product with enough features to attract early-adopter customers and
validate a product idea early in the product development cycle. In industries
such as software, the MVP can help the product team receive user feedback as
quickly as possible to iterate and improve the product.
It is based in the Lean Principle of Build → Measure → Learn
The goal is to build a version that the customers can test – while testing the
creators can observe how the customer interacts with the product and ascertain
which features are considered valuable by the customer and which are not.
Features of MVP:
• The product contains enough features that it will be purchased by the
consumer
• It will have a feedback mechanism that allows the user to send their
feedback about the product.
• It should have enough future benefits for the early adopters
• It should be a product that the customer is willing to pay for
A Path to the MVP
Steve Blank 4
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Building your MVP MLP Testing Feedback
MVP
MVP is a Lean Startup technique where you build the mockup of the solution
and present it to your customers for feedback. Remember, you had identified
and listed the top 2-3 features of your solution on your Lean Canvas Also,
you had identified the most important features your competitors are offering
in the assignment, Competition Analysis.
However, are you certain that your top 2-3 features will work? To be certain,
you need to formulate and test a solution. Remember to invest a lot in
building a full-fledged solution is a waste. So, it Is recommended that you test
the solution with a demo before building the actual [Link] play a
significant role in market research for a new product. It helps the
entrepreneur achieve the following goals:
• Test customer experience
• Faster release time
• Save costs
How to plan an MVP
Ycombinator
Getting the MVP Right
Steve Blanc
Steps to Define the MVP
1. Identify the specs you want to test
2. Set a timeline within which you want to test it
3. Be thrifty – try to do it in the lowest possible cost without
compromising Debate High Impact Include in MVP
A simple way to rank product Low
High
features Urgency
Urgency
Don’t Include Low Impact Revisit
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MVP →MLP
MVP MLP Testing Feedback
If it is your first time hearing the word MLP, you could think of it as the
advanced version of MVP. An MVP is the minimum required version to test the
product or a service. Many companies create an MVP as a way to launch a
product with basic functionality quickly, to test the true market demand.
However, delivering the bare minimum can sometimes give some false
indicators, as some products won't have the same testing environment unless
they are fully functional.
This is how the idea of having a lovable product was born. A Minimum Lovable
Product (MLP) is an initial offering that users love from the start. It represents
the minimum required for customers to adore a product rather than merely
enduring it.
To understand the concept of MLP better, it is just as integral that you
understand what an MVP is, and what it is not! And MLP is not a proof of
concept, a prototype, a half-baked version of the product or a cheaper version
of the product. It is not about building multiple minimum products or hitting
some magic release date!
🚀 MVP: Minimum Viable Product – this is a version of your product that you
first launch to your customers. It has the bare minimum number of features to
solve their problem, and is most commonly used as a testing tool only.
❤️MLP: Minimum Lovable Product – similar to an MVP, but with more thought
and care taken in design and UI. It aims to solve the problem, but also delight.
💰 MMP: Minimum Marketable Product – this is the version of your MVP (or MLP)
which you’ll push to market.
Out With The MVP, In With The MLP
Forbes
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MLPs and Examples MVP MLP Testing Feedback
Now if you want to create an MLP for your business, what would you
choose? Well that depends on the type of your business and the service or
the product that you can provide. The diagram below depicts the difference
between MVP and MLP.
This graphic does a great job of putting the MLP into perspective: it’s not
just the functional/product side of your offering. It’s about getting a little
taste of every aspect of what makes your startup unique. Your MLP is a
small cross-section of the whole experience you want to provide. Once you
get feedback on it, you keep building several iterations of your MLP
ensuring that your product has the functionality, reliability, usability and
emotional design desired by the customer in each iteration.
Example of MLP:
Back in 2010 Uber did one simple thing: connected drivers with
iPhone owners in San Francisco who weren't scared to have
credit card payments enabled in an unknown app.
It was enough to fulfill their main goal: offer taxi services as
cheap as possible with an experience of convenience. Also, it
helped Uber validate their assumption “Would people love the
experience enough to give out the information of their credit
card to an unknown app?
Will they do it again and again and tell their friends about it?”
This successful MLP test led them to iterate further and build
the giant we know today.
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7
MLP Testing– Customer
MVP MLP
Interviews
Testing Feedback
Two key questions you need to ask yourself while testing an MVP:
Question 1: What is my riskiest assumption?
Question 2: What is the smallest experiment I can do to test this assumption?
Building your MLP is an iterative process and in all probability, you
cannot get it right in the first instance.
• Once you conduct your customer interviews, the next step is
refining your MLP. But before you start that it is important to
analyze the interactions and convert them into intelligent, actionable
steps.
• Start with the hypothesis/ risky assumption that you set out to test.
• Analyze the data:
• The customer quotes
• The observation from the interaction with the MVP
• The verbal and non-verbal cues
• Cluster your learnings and check for cross linkages, patterns and
common themes
• Arrive at a conclusion. Is your hypothesis:
• Proved
• Dis-proved
• In-conclusive
• Refine your MVP and move on to the next hypothesis that you need
to test .
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8
Developingand
Testing MLP
MVP MLP Testing Feedback
Next stage is developing and testing your MLP. Again the whole idea of the
creation of an MLP is testing the concepts you are trying to validate, so
always keep this as your goal.
Developing and Testing Your MLP
Minimum Lovable Product: The Evolution of Minimum Viable Product
Source: Forbes
Some pointers for Building an MVP:
1. If you are building for businesses, your MLP needs a better focus on
functionality and reliability. If you are building for consumers, focus more
on usability and emotional design.
2. Think about how your product’s adoption is going to change the customer’s
current systems in use. Think of the easiest way for the customer to
transition to your product and integrate seamlessly with all systems already
in place.
3. If you are a company with a great brand name in the market and you want
to do an MLP test with a new product, use a pseudo brand name and do the
experiment in a separate sandbox. Once the MLP is successful, you can
integrate the product with your current brand, so that a failure doesn’t hurt
your brand reputation.
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Call to action MVP MLP Testing Feedback
Step 1: Build your MLP
Debat High Impact Include in MVP
Identify the key hypothesis that you e
want to test and zero down on the
features that you will need to build to High
Low
test it. Urgency
Urgency
Try to minimize the cost – the goal is to
test user experience. In doing so,
ensure that the MVP is not too simple, Low Impact
and the user can actually test the A simple way to rank product
features
feature
Step 2: Testing your MLP
Step-2.1: Define what you built as your MLP by listing its key features.
Step-2.3: Detail out how you will do the test by answering the following questions:
• How long will we test this MLP?
• Who is our target audience? How many of them?
• How will we get to that audience?
Step-2.3: Write down the results of the experiment by answering the following
questions:
• Did enough customers buy? Why or why not?
• Did customers pay the price we expected? Why or why not?
• Did customers come back to our product or show interest in doing so?
• Did customers recommend our product to others or evangelize about it?
10
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Call to action MVP MLP Testing Feedback
Step-2.4:
Based on the results of the experiment, you need to take a decision to either
persevere with your MLP or change course by doing a pivot. Sometimes, the
test might be inconclusive if it was poorly run or there wasn’t enough
relevant data. In such situations, you will have to tweak the test and set it up
again to get conclusive results.
Step-2.5:
Write down all the learnings, realizations or insights you got from the test
and how these would guide the next step forward.
Step-2.6:
Write down actionable next steps you want to take as a result of all the
learnings you had from your MLP test.
What is your MLP? <Key features of the MLP> 1
Test Details: 2 Conclusion: 4
How long will we test this MLP? Persevere
Pivot
Who is our target audience for the test? How many of them?
Not conclusive
How will we get to that audience?
Results of Test: 3 Realizations / Insights: 5
Did enough customers buy? Why or why not?
Did customers pay the price we expected? Why or why not?
Did customers come back to our product or show interest in doing so?
Why or why not?
Did customers recommend our product to others or evangelize about it? Next Steps: 6
Why or why not?
11
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Call to action MVP MLP Testing Feedback
Step 4: Analyze the data:
• Sources of data:
• The customer quotes
• The observation from the interaction with the MVP
• The verbal and non-verbal cues
• Cluster your learnings and check for cross linkages, patterns and
common themes
• Thematic Structuring
• Cross-participant connections and cluster related evidence
• Arrive at a conclusion. Is your hypothesis:
• Proved
• Dis-proved
• In-conclusive
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