MVP stands for Minimum Viable Product, and it’s the simplest and often cheapest version of a product you can build that solves a customer problem. If you’re targeting a problem that’s important to a customer, they will use the MVP even though it’s not a mature product.
MVPs are a way to address this risk. Building an MVP requires you to understand the problems you want to address. For each problem you want to address, you have to also uncover the process(steps) required to solve that problem. Knowing these problem-solving steps allows you to build a solution that addresses all or a subset of them. How you address those steps is where the concept of an MVP comes in. You can develop a solution that addresses these steps at different costs and implementation times. Unless your customer has numerous alternatives, you can initially solve the problem you’re targeting in the most cost-effective and efficient way possible and improve your solution over time. If, however, your customer has numerous other options, your solution must often be at least as good as your competition.
If you can, show the proposal of what the MVP will be – before building
When building or enhancing a product, there is always a risk that you could be building a solution that doesn’t solve the problem you want to address. Showing a plan/proposal before building something helps lower this. MVPs are a safeguard against spending a lot of resources building something that doesn’t truly address a customer problem.
When showing a plan/proposal to a customer, keep in mind that the more real the proposal or plan is (sketch on paper vs 3d model) the more accurate input you can get on whether your solution will solve the customer’s problem.
