Minimum Viable Product (MVP)

• An app that delivers value with at most one click
• Examples:
  • Twitter, Facebook, ...
  • join.me
  • Flappy Bird
  • Flashlight

• Strip away everything but your best feature
• What you skip is as important as what you keep
  • Getting Real: the One-Point Vision (p. 38)
• Every feature you add
  • delays release
  • adds code to be maintained
  • adds complexity and distraction to the user interface

• Kano model
  • Delighters: things so people want your product
    • one-click purchase, automatic rebate filing, ...
  • Must-haves: things so people can use your product
    • login, user accounts, save changes, ...
• Which should you build first?
  • delighters, until you have a viable product
  • Then, must-haves, until you have a product

• Write a script of a specific person using your app, from problem to payoff
• Implement the payoff first
• Example: WorkIt! a Siri™ for exercisers
  • Wanda, a work-at-home graphic artist, takes her mid-morning exercise break. She taps the WorkIt!, hits Start and WorkIt! starts calling out the steps in the exercise routine Wanda designed for herself.
  • Implement and test that, before anything else.

• A demo is a story with characters, context, problem, and payoff
  • Character: someone with a background, needs, and opinions
  • Context: the situation someone is in
  • Problem: a specific problem, one that arises often
  • Payoff: your app coming to the rescue!
• Kim Goodwin on design scenarios

• Too much stuff.
  • Eric Ries (1:11 mark) : "I don't know what your MVP is, but I know it's eight times too big"
  • 10 so-so features = 1 boring app.
• Fake data, e.g., "Joe Student", "Lorem ipsum..."
  • Try selling Twitter with dummy names and lorem ipsum tweets.
  • Maybe your idea doesn't work with real data!

Thanks to Hakim El Hattab for the slide template