Minimum viable product
Encyclopedia
In product development
, the Minimum Viable Product or MVP is a strategy used for fast and quantitative market testing of a product or product feature, popularized by Eric Ries
for web applications
.
A MVP is not a minimal product, it is a strategy and process directed toward making and selling a product to customers. It is an iterative process of idea generation, prototyping, presentation, data collection, analysis and learning. One seeks to minimize the total time spent on an iteration. The process is iterated until a desirable product-market fit is obtained, or until the product is deemed to be non-viable.
tools and languages common to web application
development.
The MVP differs from the conventional market testing strategy of investing time and money early to implement a product before testing it in the market. The MVP is intended to ensure that the market wants the product before a large time and monetary investment is made. The MVP differs from the open source methodology of release early, release often
that listens to users, letting them define the features and future of the product. The MVP starts with a product vision, which is maintained throughout the product life cycle, although is adapted based on the explicit and implicit (indirect measures) feedback from potential future customers of the product.
The MVP is a strategy that may be used as a part of Steven Blank
's customer development methodology that focuses on continual product iteration and refinement based on customer feedback. Additionally, the presentation of non-existing products and features may be refined using web-based statistical hypothesis testing
, such as A/B testing
.
The general method of deploy first, code later is akin to the agile program code testing methodology called test-driven development
where unit tests are written before and fail until the code is written.
New product development
In business and engineering, new product development is the term used to describe the complete process of bringing a new product to market. A product is a set of benefits offered for exchange and can be tangible or intangible...
, the Minimum Viable Product or MVP is a strategy used for fast and quantitative market testing of a product or product feature, popularized by Eric Ries
Eric Ries
Eric Ries is a Silicon Valley entrepreneur and author recognized for pioneering the Lean Startup movement, a new-business strategy which directs startup companies to allocate their resources as efficiently as possible. He is also a well-known blogger within the technology entrepreneur...
for web applications
Web application
A web application is an application that is accessed over a network such as the Internet or an intranet. The term may also mean a computer software application that is coded in a browser-supported language and reliant on a common web browser to render the application executable.Web applications are...
.
Description
A Minimum Viable Product has just those features that allow the product to be deployed, and no more. The product is typically deployed to a subset of possible customers, such as early adopters that are thought to be more forgiving, more likely to give feedback, and able to grasp a product vision from an early prototype or marketing information. It is a strategy targeted at avoiding building products that customers do not want, that seeks to maximize the information learned about the customer per dollar spent. "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." The definition's use of the words maximum and minimum means it is decidedly not formulaic. It requires judgment to figure out, for any given context, what MVP makes sense.A MVP is not a minimal product, it is a strategy and process directed toward making and selling a product to customers. It is an iterative process of idea generation, prototyping, presentation, data collection, analysis and learning. One seeks to minimize the total time spent on an iteration. The process is iterated until a desirable product-market fit is obtained, or until the product is deemed to be non-viable.
Techniques
A Minimum Viable Product may be an entire product or a sub-set of product (such as a feature).- Product: (smoke testSmoke testSmoke testing refers to physical tests made to closed systems of pipes to test for leaks. By metaphorical extension, the term is also used for the first test made after assembly or repairs to a system, to provide some assurance that the system under test will not catastrophically fail...
) The canonical MVP strategy for a web application is to create a mock website for the product and purchase online advertising to direct traffic to the site. The mock website may consist of a marketing landing page with a link for more information or purchase. The link is not connected to a purchasing system, instead clicks are recorded and measure customer interest. - Feature: (deploy first, code later) A link to a new feature in a web application may be provided in a prominent location on an existing website. The feature is not implemented, rather an apology, mock-up, or marketing page is provided. Clicks of the link are recorded and provide an indication as to the demand for the feature in the customer base.
Differentiation
Releasing and assessing the impact of a minimum viable product is a market testing strategy that is used to screen product ideas soon after their generation. It is facilitated by Rapid Application DevelopmentRapid application development
Rapid application development is a software development methodology that uses minimal planning in favor of rapid prototyping. The "planning" of software developed using RAD is interleaved with writing the software itself...
tools and languages common to web application
Web application
A web application is an application that is accessed over a network such as the Internet or an intranet. The term may also mean a computer software application that is coded in a browser-supported language and reliant on a common web browser to render the application executable.Web applications are...
development.
The MVP differs from the conventional market testing strategy of investing time and money early to implement a product before testing it in the market. The MVP is intended to ensure that the market wants the product before a large time and monetary investment is made. The MVP differs from the open source methodology of release early, release often
Release early, release often
Release early, release often is a software development philosophy that emphasizes the importance of early and frequent releases in creating a tight feedback loop between developers and testers or users...
that listens to users, letting them define the features and future of the product. The MVP starts with a product vision, which is maintained throughout the product life cycle, although is adapted based on the explicit and implicit (indirect measures) feedback from potential future customers of the product.
The MVP is a strategy that may be used as a part of Steven Blank
Steven Gary Blank
Steve Blank is a Silicon Valley-based retired serial entrepreneur, founding and/or part of 8 startup companies in California’s Silicon Valley after dropping out of the University of Michigan...
's customer development methodology that focuses on continual product iteration and refinement based on customer feedback. Additionally, the presentation of non-existing products and features may be refined using web-based statistical hypothesis testing
Statistical hypothesis testing
A statistical hypothesis test is a method of making decisions using data, whether from a controlled experiment or an observational study . In statistics, a result is called statistically significant if it is unlikely to have occurred by chance alone, according to a pre-determined threshold...
, such as A/B testing
A/B testing
A/B testing, split testing or bucket testing is a method of marketing testing by which a baseline control sample is compared to a variety of single-variable test samples in order to improve response rates...
.
The general method of deploy first, code later is akin to the agile program code testing methodology called test-driven development
Test-driven development
Test-driven development is a software development process that relies on the repetition of a very short development cycle: first the developer writes a failing automated test case that defines a desired improvement or new function, then produces code to pass that test and finally refactors the new...
where unit tests are written before and fail until the code is written.
See also
- The Cathedral and the BazaarThe Cathedral and the BazaarThe Cathedral and the Bazaar is an essay by Eric S. Raymond on software engineering methods, based on his observations of the Linux kernel development process and his experiences managing an open source project, fetchmail. It examines the struggle between top-down and bottom-up design...
- Startup companyStartup companyA startup company or startup is a company with a limited operating history. These companies, generally newly created, are in a phase of development and research for markets...
- Customer Development
- Steven Gary BlankSteven Gary BlankSteve Blank is a Silicon Valley-based retired serial entrepreneur, founding and/or part of 8 startup companies in California’s Silicon Valley after dropping out of the University of Michigan...
- Lean StartupLean Startup"Lean startup" is a term coined by Eric Ries, his method advocates the creation of rapid prototypes designed to test market assumptions, and uses customer feedback to evolve them much faster than via more traditional product development practices, such as the Waterfall model...
External links
- What is the minimum viable product?, Venture Hacks: Advice for entrepreneurs, March 23 2009
- Minimum Viable Product: a guide, Lessons Learned, Eric Ries, August 3 2009
- Approaching a Minimum Viable Product, Three Rivers Institute: Thoughts on Programming, Kent Beck, August 7th, 2009
- 10 examples of minimum viable products, Venture Hacks: Advice for entrepreneurs, October 27th, 2009
- Minimum Viable Product revisited – the MVP Curve?, Methodologist, January 12 2010
- The Bootstrapper's Guide to Launching New Products Inc. Oct 1, 2009
- Minimum Viable Product SyncDev 2008
- Smoke test sample