MVP is the most misunderstood concept in Startupland

Descriptions of MVP go something like this:

‘you have to BUILD to test your idea…’

This approach has wasted tech founders millions and tons of time.

And it’s all down to a misunderstanding…

The confusion isn’t at all surprising when you consider that there’s a yawning gap between the concept described in the source material and regurgitated versions of that description in a gazillion of ‘What’s an MVP’ articles scattered all over the internet.

You’ve probably come across these descriptions yourself

Atlassian: 'the simplest version of a product that you need to build to sell it to a market'.

Product School: 'a product development strategy that focuses on building the most essential features'.

Product board: 'is a product with enough features to attract early adopter customers'.

Techopedia: 'a new product that has just enough features to attract early adopters'.

Wikipedia: 'a version of a product with just enough features to be usable by early customers'.

All these interpret an MVP as the smallest version of the product you have to build to test your idea.

The misconception that you HAVE TO BUILD to test an idea traps many founders.

Non-eng founders scramble for resources to hire someone to build an MVP for them.

Eng founders spend an inordinate amount of time building their MVPs.
(Perhaps because some are secretly looking for an excuse to write code without anyone looking over their shoulder.)

And when you buy into

the ‘I need to BUILD an MVP to test my idea’ mantra,

you choose to waste huge amounts of time, money and effort…

…often, with very little to show for it at the end of the process.

(Not to mention the emotional toll that it takes on you.)

To help us escape this trap, let’s go back to the source material.

There we discover that the core idea has been obscured by lazy (mis)interpretations of the concept.

In 2009 Eric Ries, the originator of the idea, provided this definition of an MVP:

"First, a definition: the minimum viable product is that version of a new product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort".

He clarifies this definition further with two caveats:

"MVP, despite the name, is not about creating minimal products."

"The definition's use of the words maximum and minimum means it is decidedly not formulaic. It requires judgement to figure out, for any given context, what MVP makes sense."

Sources

And there you have it.

There is no mention of building.

In fact, a crucial element of the MVP definition is that

‘it requires judgement to figure out, for any given context, what MVP makes sense.’

It follows that an MVP can be

• a blog post,
• a (free) landing page,
• a video demo of how the product would work*,
• ‘becoming a second-hand clothes seller for a bit’**,

and any number of other ‘versions’ of an MVP.
(With the exception of surveys. But that’s a topic for another day.)

So, if you have an idea for a digital product, ask yourself

“How might I test fundamental business hypotheses
without writing a single line of code?”.

And if you get stuck…

…go back to the source.

Or ask for help.

*Dropbox
**Fleek