How do you know when you are ready for mvp?
Greetings, I am in the development phase of a relatively large SaaS project. I have determined the product features, the services we will offer to the user, and most of the services. But I don't know exactly how to decide the right mvp point. I would be glad if you share your thoughts on this.
Hey there! Congrats on bringing your idea to life.
I work with lots of first-time founders through my small incubator in the middle of Maine, and I think that the best way to evaluate customer demand for any idea is with paying customers.
Have you talked to potential customers about what you're bringing to life?
I think that an ideal time to build an MVP might happen after several steps (in order to get an understanding of what exactly should get built):
What do you think?
Is there some merit to the idea of taking the most common use case/pain point, and seeing if that can be sold at a minimum acceptable rate?
Just wondering if this idea is practical.
It definitely can be!
I'd say that the more focused your first offering is, the more focused you'll be able to be when it comes to finding potential customers. And as you're talking with potential customers, you can ask questions like:
These questions always allow me to understand whether any given potential customer has a willingness to pay. If your customer is willing to pay, ask a follow-up: How much are you willing to pay?
Then you can send your invoice. As you're getting going (and establishing a market of "how much my customer is willing to pay), it's very okay for different customers to pay you different prices. I generally find that it's easier, too, because price turns into a conversation rather than a negotiation.
The faster you release your offering, the faster you'll be able to learn from paying customers and make improvements to your offering. It's really easy for me to get into the habit of "I'll just add this one thing", which always has turned into a cascade of other "just one things".
What do you think?
Thank you for the thorough reply. Gladly, I'm not in the market for creating a new product but I was always curious about this. For my own edification.
For the price, are you presenting options or looking to the prospective user to suggest some ideas?
I wonder if there is some good literature around how many features to bundle up to make an effect product. E.g. (taking Hypefury here as an example):
A. Tweet threads only = no
B. Tweet threads + schedule = maybe
C. Tweet Threads + schedule + engagement list = ok
I think that it's a great idea (and I'll definitely plan to add this to my pricing article because it's an excellent point).
Usually, after talking with customers, I'll identify what the core value proposition is (and sometimes it's--as you suggest--more than what I originally guessed). I think that the best possible signal for evaluating customer demand (before having a product) is to get your potential customers to pay for what you're gonna build (and that might mean bundling things up).