10 MVP
Launch Tips
90% Founders
Often Overlook
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Greetings, thrill seeker!
Like any founder and entrepreneur, you've probably got your eyes on the lean startup concept that
helped numerous teams quickly test their hypotheses on early adopters.
It suggests going the minimum viable product (MVP) way and ditching the long route of developing
something large, expensive, and full-scale. By focusing on the essentials that can help you validate the
feasibility of your ideas, the input effort, investment, and time are comparably small. Sounds like a winwin, as most startups don't have much cash to spend to begin with. Nor do they usually have the
talent to develop a full-fledged product.
But launching your own business is always a risk. And although it's much faster, the MVP route still
doesn't guarantee you'll avoid the common rollercoaster-like ups and downs of building a startup.
The experience can bring you the adrenaline rush when your early product version swings up to its
peak (e.g., when it gets a bunch of downloads). But it can likewise leap your heart into your mouth
with sudden unexpected loops like market shifts or disorienting upside-down moments like
recessions. You never know which twists and turns lie ahead.
To say the least, MVPs imply quality product execution. They also pose the challenge of finding the
balance between your "minimum" and "viable".
Plus, many underestimate the importance of planning and following the proven best practices when
bringing the MVP to life. And this is why scenarios with messy processes and tons of wasted
resources are so common.
Are you sure you're doing everything right?
If you want your startup's minimum viable product creation process to be a smooth ride instead of a
heart-thumping rollercoaster, take a peek behind the curtain to find the best kept secrets of
building an (we've released over of them, so we know what we're talking about)
10
MVP
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Instead of a snapshot featuring your rollercoaster
emotions, we have an editable MVP checklist
waiting for you in the end.
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Browse the top 10 secrets
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10 MVP Tips Founders Frequently Miss
Focus on Planning, Build with Precision
"Architectural" work starts on paper. Just as if you'd first be blueprinting a building's
construction plan, you have many decisions to make before you get the excavators and
cement trucks started. Don't forget why you're building the MVP in the first place.
What's the problem you're tackling? Whose problem is it? How exactly are you going to
solve it? What do you want to test?
A leap of faith and a solemn belief in luck isn't enough. You need a plan in place, you
need facts that'll help you gain confidence that you aren't imagining a problem or, even
worse, creating a solution that doesn't have a problem. Proof of concept, a go-tomarket strategy, a scalable tech stack, and a financial plan are essential.
Confirm that the problem is worth solving, that you're targeting the right audience, know via which channels to reach
them, that the market is large enough, your offering is unique, and that you'll be able to withstand the competition.
You can learn a lot even without a product. If you initiate work on an MVP development project before taking care of
all of this, it's like diving for treasures without bothering to check for sharks and other dangers hidden below the
surface. You'll be one step away from a "false start".
Conducting thorough market research and planning are your first focus areas, and you can't
skip this. Operating only on assumptions without research as backup is not the way to go. This
is your cash, this is your time, this may be your big-time disappointment that could be avoided
if you put in the effort to do your homework prior to working on clickable prototypes, designs,
and code.
Tip
1/10
Trim the Non-Essentials
As you've already heard many times, less is more. Do you really have to include all of that
functionality now? Are you sure you need all those bows and ribbons? Makes sense. But
prioritizing features to include in your MVP and knowing how to put the rest on the back
burner is easier said than done. You don't have a product yet, your users haven't seen it yet.
So, how do you pinpoint the essentials?
One way out is focusing on the core, the very heart that gets your product pumping and lives up to the productsolution aims you've lined out. It's not the time for excessive functionality or design fluff (not now, at least). You have
to weed out the "good-to-haves" and leave only the "must-includes" as an MVP starting point. What if just two or
three features are enough? Which ones will hook your target audience?
Likewise, evaluate how important specific functionality is to a user. Choose those features that'll attract people, let
them discover its value, and get them to come back again. This will let you determine what to release in your earliest
product versions or save for consequent iterations.
When you first start working on your minimum viable product, make sure you chop away all the
extra features in your plan. Remember that you want to test your idea's viability via the
smallest possible feature set. With specific priorities, a list of features people might want to pay
for, and a focus on the product core, you'll be able to get your maximum learnings, cut costs,
reach the market faster, and have better chances at finding product-market fit later on. Bottom
line: avoid feature clutter, it's for your own good.
Tip
2/10
Step on the Gas with Development
No matter what they say, when it comes to MVPs, faster IS better than perfect. Don't take
this the wrong way, though, because this isn't a call to action persuading you to serve your
product undercooked.
You don't want to take the risk of "putting crunchy spaghetti" before your early adopters,
as, most likely, they're not going to like it, and they certainly won't cut you some slack
because "it's just an MVP". Pulling cheap stunts like that can lead you to a shutdown faster
than expected. And yet it makes sense to step up a notch when building an MVP.
Following up on the above, time is another reason why you should have a laser focus on a well-prioritized feature
list. Yup, time is money, and you should aim at hitting the market quicker, learning something, and continuing to
iterate. This is what the lean startup approach and agile development teach us. But make sure you don't release
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something half built
!
Try to find the golden medium when planning your MVP's development timeline. You need to
deliver a
quality pilot version in the shortest possible time frames to start testing your
ideas, gathering data and feedback, and learning from your findings.
Concentrate your efforts
on the things that matter most and leave the rest for later.
Tip
3/10
Pursue Perfection, Triple-Check the Quality
Let's emphasize this one more time: fast doesn't mean poorly executed. Thousands of products are competing for
attention. So whatever you show to people has to be polished.
Why should people test out and pay for your product instead of the tons available
out there? Regardless of the solution's current size, it has to deliver value straight
away. Otherwise, how can you expect your early adopters to appreciate your
offering and become excited about its upcoming upgrades? Security, data privacy,
proper tech stack selection, and overall quality are equally important. But it's not just
about the functional side, though.
Crappy Substandard and unsatisfactory UX/UI or a bugging feature will most
probably disappoint your users. They came to your product to give it a shot, and
they don't want to be frustrated by irrationally lengthy forms, glitchy menus,
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annoying, unclosable pop ups, and other things you didn't test out yourself.
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Mind that early users aren't your "crash test dummies". Perhaps cross checking an interactive prototype before MVP
coding can chip off many bumps. You want user acquisition to be the love at first sight kind of thing "come and
conquer" style. But this won't happen if your minimum viable product fails to bring what you're promising to the table.
User expectations are high in any event, so try not to let them down.
Once again, releasing your MVP and showing it to the world when it's not ready yet is a terrible
idea. You don't want to make a bad first impression at all costs. Although small, the product has
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to be thoroughly tested, error free, with a logical user journey and intuitive
Tip
UX.
Keep your standards high, as you want users to discover your product's potential, get excited
about its strengths early on, and accept it even without the complete functionality set and "tobe" add-ons. It's impossible to achieve this if your MVP is too "minimum", glitchy, or sloppy.
4/10
Don't Break Your Piggy Bank
Kind of like heart over mind, one too often entrepreneurs face the "enthusiasm over
cash" situation. If you spend money irrationally and mindlessly, you'll have financial
trouble. Whether your startup is backed by investors or not, spending money on
excessive things (even during the early MVP stages) leads to capital burn, possibly
before you make enough profit off the product.
Mind your money, as knowing how to stretch the runway can really make a
difference. To do so, consider following the best practices of cash conservation
and smart savings.
As such, think about the affordability of your MVP decisions, as cash is always a big danger zone. Once again, if
you're positive about the specific core feature set you need to work on first, this will cut your initial expenses on
design, development, testing, and so on, saving you from overinvesting in things that are less important now.
On the flip side, cheaping out can also have its consequences. Say, you may use a no-code drag-and-drop builder to
assemble an MVP quickly, but chances are that your solution will turn out to be disposable. This means that you'll
have to rebuild it from scratch sometime down the line, as it won't be capable of scaling, handling the capacity, won't
be flexible enough, etc.
Being financially literate from the outset is integral for entrepreneurs. If you're smart about
spending money from the earliest MVP stages, you can safeguard the business from
running out of money too soon or facing the need to invest in rebuilding the product from
the ground up.
Tip
5/10
Search Far and Wide for Best-Fit Talent
Wild guess: you'd probably be very serious about hiring people you could trust to build your own house. Well, yeah,
because execution matters, and so much is at stake! Assembling a well-tuned team that's on the same page is tough.
Startups need to find, screen, interview, and interest people to join. Right from the early startup days, these should be
qualified and experienced people with versatile backgrounds and skills that complement each other.
Even if your startup is a one- or two-man band, you'll most likely need to find those with the required knowledge to
build your product. And it's not just about quality and time. The development team hiring path you select is also a
vital financial aspect.
Can you really afford to have all those experienced developers, designers, and other team roles onboard in-house?
Will you be able to manage several freelancers located on different continents? Or are there more budget-friendly
options like MVP outsourcing that'll allow you to achieve the same without compromising time, quality, etc.?
Although you can't afford to have a mediocre MVP built, "shop around" before deciding to hire
in-house. Salaries, bonuses, paid time off, and other essentials can take up a huge chunk of your
pie. Multiple individual freelancers are usually too hard to organize into a coordinated team,
resulting in a resource drain.
At times, going for outsourced MVP development can visibly cut costs. It may also let you get
your hands on some unattainable otherwise professional advice from those who've built dozens
of MVPs as a bonus. This includes anything from the optimal technology stack to ways to cut
corners in terms of development time. Yet, every hiring path is unique.
Tip
6
/10
Find the Sweet Spot and Set a Reasonable Price
Convincing people that your product is worth paying for is one side of the coin. The
gains of doing this have to be evident. The other side is knowing how to put an
optimal price tag on your offering. It's an art, really, as a lack of a proper
monetization strategy can shake up your product's chances of success.
Here's the thing: if your asking price is too low, then it might be difficult to reach
profitability. Your only option here is to try to acquire as many customers as
possible, hooking them with a cheap price.
On the contrary, if you overprice, this might as well mean that your sales cycle will be much longer (and not all
startups can afford the wait). Hence, do your research instead of putting a random price sticker you think is
reasonable.
Consider the various pricing models available and ensure you know how much you're paying to
build the product. Weigh different price-influencing factors like demand and what your
competitors are charging for their offerings.
What's for monetization, you don't have to pick a side. Get the best of both worlds or take a shot
at pricing models like free trials or freemiums that let the target audience "taste a small sample".
Granting partial access to your offering (either limited-time or to a limited feature set) allows
users to test and try what you have to offer without making a purchase commitment right away.
This facilitates the likelihood of them realizing the value your product has and getting them
interested.
Tip
7/10
Zoom In on the Feedback
For one thing, you have to know how to listen. Remember that you're rolling out an MVP for viability testing purposes,
which implies collecting data and analyzing feedback to make consequent conclusions on how to proceed with the
project and what to modify on your roadmap. So, be open to hearing people's opinions. For instance, if many users
complain that your checkout process is too complicated and extensive, this may be a point to act on.
On another note, though, if feedback is king, is all of it "royal"? Here's a stumbling block many entrepreneurs trip
on. Your friends and relatives can be cheering you on in the early days, supporting you and saying things like, "This
is brilliant, I'd definitely use this product". But will they, and do they actually?
Be honest and stop flattering yourself: if your acquaintances and community members aren't part of your target
audience group, then their opinions are secondhand. Period.
We're not encouraging you to have trust issues, but to find the truth, you must filter through your feedback. Hence,
if someone says "Jump", it doesn't mean you should immediately start amending the features or investing in building
new things.
Don't forget that you're at the MVP stage, so there's no way you'll make everyone happy.
Sift through received feedback carefully, group your findings, pinpoint actual insights, and
weigh your product decisions carefully.
Some of your target group's suggestions should be worth considering, yet others can steer
you away from your aims, business direction, or concept altogether.
Tip
8/10
Find Wisdom in Failure
Mistakes aren't all bad, and failures will happen. Your product might be poorly targeted or suffer from low acquisition
or retention. It might not be bringing you the expected ROI or working the way you envisioned.
Failures are not roadblocks, they're your progress stepping stones. If your
experiment or its part failed, you should try to find out the "whys", make
conclusions, and build up on that. So, dust yourself off, analyze the data, try to
identify the weak spots, and brainstorm innovative ways out. That's just how the
agile approach works.
It's discouraging, of course, but you need entrepreneurial stamina for this kind of
stuff. Don't forget that every mistake and failure is a chance to reassess, adapt,
and come back stronger.
Yes, mistakes happen, they're inevitable. But if you manage to learn from your "wrongs", this
can let you make more accurate shots and better-calculated decisions next time.
It is also advisable to have a knowledge management system worked out where you can
structure and store your experiment results, stating what your hypotheses were, the results,
and the conclusions made.
Tip
9/10
mbrace the Agile Mindset, Master
the Art of Iteration
E
chieving product sustainability and profitability is an ongoing goal. Your product
could be built for years from MVP and onward, yet developing all the features you
planned doesn't put a full stop. There is no definitive end to the project, really.
A
hat can you do? Encourage your team to think creatively and explore new ideas.
Regularly evaluate your product's usability and user experience. Utilize data
analytics to identify pain points and areas where enhancements can be made.
W
You have to keep iterating, improving, upgrading. And as you do, don't make the big common entrepreneur mistake:
remember that the best practices described in the previous 9 points have to be applied when working on subsequent
MVP upgrades and product versions.
You can never reach a point when you know it all. And if you think you did, don't let that stop you from learning.
After all, you may be wrong about something.
imely pivots can, at times, be crucial for survival. But you have to be equipped with the most recent facts and a
steady plan to make such a strategic decision. Yet, drastic turns or a dramatic change of direction or focus without a
game plan can be very dangerous. Yes, you do have to have one hand on the pulse at all times to leverage arising
opportunities and be able to adapt. However, at the same time, you have to be cautious, too.
T
Recheck your facts, do your research once more, and constantly monitor your metrics. You
could have missed something. Being a blind know-it-all can sink your business. Times change,
user needs often do too. To be one step ahead, you must be on the lookout for changes and
ways to boost your offering or recognize the necessity to make a pivot altogether before it's
too late.
Tip
10/10
And the Practical Part
Now that you're armed with knowledge and are aware of the things to avoid when building a minimum viable product,
you can move on to the MVP Launch Checklist we've put together for you so you can make sure that everything is on
track with your MVP development plan.
Inside, you'll find a detailed list of things to take care of to ensure a smoother launch. For your convenience, the list is
editable, so you can mark the status of each point (such as Planned, In Progress, or Done). In the end, you'll get to
assess how well you're prepared
Get Your MVP Launch Checklist
Need a hand with your MVP?
We know that building MVPs can be one hell of a ride! In fact, Upsilon's team has built
over 25 of them utilizing the agile approach. We've helped various-sized startups bring
their ideas to life, and some of them even made 9-digit exits!
If you're in search of a team to whom you can entrust your minimum viable product
creation, our talent pool has versatile, experienced specialists who might just be what
you're looking for!
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