4 Reasons You Should Definitely Build A Minimum Viable Product
A minimum viable product is a method for cultivating a product in a basic form and managing it so that its release onto the market will gather information about the market’s response and the potential in whatever industry it may be. It’s essentially a testing protocol, to see what works and what doesn’t ahead of a fully-fledged product launch. In order to create an MVP, a product is stripped back to its bare minimum to try and solve a problem, fill a gap or otherwise justify its own existence within the context of the market. Failing that, it tests the waters as to marketability in the face of competition and to what extent there is a demand for the product. This approach to releasing a product has many different advantages that make it a powerful tool worth the time and effort that it can sometimes take. Let’s look at four such advantages.
1. Securing Financial Backing For A Product
One of the key steps in business at the early stage is securing a stakeholder or investor buy-in. “The financial support for a company will often depend heavily on the quality and prospects of its products making an MVP an excellent way to demonstrate the potential in your business to investors”, says Jerome King, business writer at Writinity and LastMinuteWriting. An MVP will give a very good early indication to anyone weighing up their stakeholder options, not only because of the results and data it gets but simply by being a concrete version of a product, something which can be shown to investors. It also means that the path to product launch after any sort of investment is short, and the momentum can be capitalized upon.
2. Assessing Market Demand
One of the biggest questions over any product is whether there is space for it in the market. This certainly isn’t the only question and there is a lot to be said for backing your marketing skill to take advantage of a crowded but weak marketplace to elevate yourself to the top of the list. However, it’s still very important to assess whether people will buy your product when you release it, it may literally be the most important thing to look at. An MVP is a great way for you to look at the response to your product and see if it fulfills a user-need and if it is in fact being used to fulfill the need.
3. Fast Development
The startup world is fast-paced and sometimes very difficult to jump into as it moves. “Companies looking to secure funding and develop products for market release will sometimes feel like things aren’t moving fast enough to stay on trend and to capitalize on the initial space in the market that they perceived”, explains Kris Bartowski, product management blogger at DraftBeyond and ResearchPapersUK. The difficulty then is trying to balance all of the many demands that fall upon a business with trying to get a product out as quickly as possible. In this instance, the MVP is invaluable since, as it is stripped to its core principles, you can release it and get market data and validation much quicker than you would a standard product.
4. Extreme Focus
A company is a large, multi-dimensional living organism that has all sorts of different drains on the attention of its members. Sometimes it can be very difficult to get back to the core principles of a company since there are so many other things going on at the same time. This is as true of the product itself which can be very difficult to assess with the degree of specificity and focus that is needed. With an MVP you can block out the noise, clear the clutter and focus on the core strengths and weaknesses of a product. That way, you are able to make highly informed and lucid decisions regarding future movements.
Conclusion
There really aren’t many drawbacks to an MVP at all. It’s an incredibly useful tool for a company, particularly for a smaller start up. You will learn a lot about your product in a short amount of time, informing all sorts of decisions for the future!
About the author: Ashley Halsey is a professional business writer, working at LuckyAssignments and GumEssays, writing on all sorts of topics relating to marketing strategy and technology for business. She spends most of her spare time travelling with her family and gathering information for her latest piece of writing.
