Your MVP is not small enough
I have been a big fan of the Fizzle podcast for more than a year and part of the Fizzle community since July 2015.
I really enjoy interacting with other entrepreneurs and exchanging opinions about building and growing a business.
Here is a piece of advice that I keep repeating in the forums:
Your Minimum Viable Product is not small enough.
You might read that and think that I’m just lazy, that I don’t want to put in the effort to build something amazing. You are wrong.
I have spent many years building different products for a variety of entrepreneurs and even my own products.
That’s what we do at Ombu Labs. I like working with entrepreneurs, that’s why 100% of our clients are startups (funded, bootstrapped, and some of them even profitable)
Every time I meet an entrepreneur who wants to work with us I like to talk about the Lean Startup methodology, Lean Canvas, and building an MVP.
I encourage them to think about their canvas in order to think about potential MVPs. To ideate an MVP you need to think about the problem, the market and your vision.
But what’s most important is creativity. You need to be creative when you come up with your MVP. This has to be your goal:
What is the minimum we can build to learn the most about our market.
Next time you have to come up with an MVP, ask yourself these questions:
- Is this MVP small enough?
- How can I make this even smaller?
- Do I really need to build all of this to learn from the people in my target market?
If so, make it smaller. Reduce waste.