The Business Value of MVP Development: Transforming Ideas into Impactful Products

Strategic development is a constant challenge for business leaders and managers. Finding a balance between competitiveness and financial efficiency is a rather interesting process. It is also clear that each specialist solves a specific range of tasks depending on their area of responsibility. For example, the CEO seeks to minimize risks, while the CTO focuses on the product's best technologies.

According to the Harvard Business Review, businesses prioritizing MVP development have a 70% success rate. MVP development is creating a simplified version of your software, platform, or application. In other words, the central aspect is that the leading MVP development process of the product during the MVP phase relies only on the creation of essential software functions. This phase will be enough to target and test the necessary audience and get customer feedback from a real user. 

MVP is one of the must-have stages for successfully entering a competitive market, and this applies to both existing businesses and new ones. From an economic point of view, using a minimum viable product is faster and more cost-effective than testing the product and adapting it to the market. 

The development process becomes more holistic and reasonable for further strategy relaxation through honest user feedback. Creating an MVP has peculiarities, which should be accompanied by expert execution and high-quality approaches. 

The Artkai team, as experts in this field, will tell you everything you need to know about developing a minimum viable product and the benefits and relevance of this starting point for projects. 

MVP Development in a Nutshell

A minimum viable product (MVP) is a special concept essential for software development. In short, MVP is the basic version of a product or application. At the initial stage, this version is created without unnecessary improvements and complex internal systems. It has the basic functions needed to solve specific user or business goals and basic interfaces as requested. 

The main goal of the minimum viable product is to test the development idea in real market conditions with early adopters as quickly as possible. In this way, early users can be gathered, and the technology concept and the entire system can be improved throughout the process, as there may be a large number of interconnected elements. 

One of the most apt descriptions of a minimum viable product is a quote from Michael Seibel, director of the Y Combinator (YC) startup accelerator: 'Hold the problem you're solving tight, hold the customer tight, hold the solution you're building loosely.' This is a kind of call for the company to be flexible in its processes and customer-oriented.

Therefore, one particular solution is not the only way. You need to remain open to changes and improvements to your product. The MVP development process is a brainstorming session with many product ideas. As a result, you can get a high-quality product because specific ideas have been accepted and implemented, considering the benefits of implementing MVPs and potential risks.

Today's modern digital business is about speed of implementation. Above all, this speed must be logically built, following logic and strategy. Therefore, MVP development services are designed to reasonably assess what is possible at a particular execution level and implement it to the extent possible. 

The goal of MVP development is to answer three main questions: 

A minimum viable product in the digital sphere is considered a kind of experiment and beta version in the niche to test business strategies. This will give business owners understand whether the development will be relevant to the audience or worth starting.

MVP opportunities for business 

First, it is worth emphasizing that a minimum viable product is a practical tool that can arouse user interest and give a real vision of your service, product, or application without damaging your business. Let's take a closer look at the benefits: 

Cost-effectiveness

When it comes to optimizing your entire business and increasing profits, an important aspect is to maintain cost-effectiveness. This can be achieved by optimizing resources and finding the right balance at each stage of MVP development process, which will be relevant for businesses looking for new ways to grow and for companies just starting. Cost-effectiveness can be achieved through several important points: 

Minimizing costs 

Traditional full-featured software development requires a lot of resources, including a development team of specialists and a budget. However, using the MVP development strategy allows you to start development with only a set of necessary and key functions without the participation of many specialists. As a result, this will result in a smaller development scope, save on resources, and minimize testing and QA costs. 

Speaking in more detail about each point, resource savings are broad and may include the use of pay-as-you-go models in many services, such as Google Cloud or AWS. This means that the company pays only for the resources that the product consumes. This includes many resources that can be used to implement this: 

Increased ROI coefficient

During MVP development, Return on Investment is created and implemented through a shorter investment cycle, as the development of a minimum viable product takes up to 3 months, which means that results can be seen in a shorter timeframe. The possibility of faster revenue generation also supports efficiency, as MVPs allow for earlier market entry and a new revenue stream that can be subject to further investment. As a result, the break-even point can be reached more quickly, and the company can move on to further scaling phases with a proven idea. 

Rationally used resources

A minimum viable product is a specific example of a lean approach to development. This approach aims to create maximum product value to the customer at minimum cost. For many businesses, this point will help control many financial processes. Also, control over resources in creating an MVP can include serverless technologies and the use of microservice architecture, which will allow for cheaper storage and processing of information before the full deployment of the product, such as using a NoSQL database. 

Faster time to market 

The MVP development model can be a quality tool for raising your product's market position. This strategy will allow you to take your market share and audience before competitors release their products. Thus, faster time to market with an MVP provides significant strategic advantages: 

Brand awareness

Even if there is a basic beta version of the development or platform, it can provide feedback about the company and its innovativeness. A product that is the first to become a market leader can get more attention from potential partners, investors, and the customer segment. 

Shortened TTM

A well-developed MVP functionality of a particular system or platform adapted to the most critical user needs can be a good impetus for a fast Time-to-Market.  In practice, when it comes to implementation, this can work, for example, by integrating with existing services via APIs instead of developing them from scratch and using ready-made components and libraries, such as React UI Kits, which can significantly save time on interface development. 

Adaptation of the strategy

When a ready-made service is on the market, albeit in a test version, there are increased chances for analysis at this stage. Thus, the company can collect the necessary metrics to determine better how to develop the product or update it further. This is achieved by analyzing competitors' behavior after launch, using the service through heatmaps or event tracking, and getting early customer feedback through CSAT and NPS analysis. 

Quickly test ideas 

A minimum viable product fully implements an idea with the ability to test it quickly and in practice. Thus, the focus is on testing the main business hypotheses of the product, service, or app and getting accurate data. In the context of a minimum viable product, quick testing of product ideas will result in a faster development cycle, focus on core features, and real user experience, especially when the focus is on B2C. 

Also, an MVP approach using flexible frameworks like Node.js or React will provide the necessary functionality for testing. In addition, you can consistently receive analytical data using Amplitude, Google Analytics, and others to analyze user behavior. 

Due to the development process, the company can make quick changes based on the collected data and audience response. 

Deep understanding of the domain 

In order to understand the domain in depth, you need to develop an MVP. This will provide real data for the service, not assumptions based on competitors. As a result, it will provide a deeper analysis of problems, identify audience pain points, and find solutions. For example, in the fintech industry, a minimum viable product can help understand why a customer might prefer a clear interface or an automated investment opportunity. 

Working on an MVP makes it possible to find white space opportunities that were not very obvious before. Such white space opportunities include unmet user needs that may not be immediately apparent. In the health tech niche, an MVP can provide insight into the fact that, for example, a user wants intuitive analytics, not just the storage of information they need to enter into the application. 

Domain expertise can be determined when the MVP development company creates a platform or product and studies competitors and the market. This will allow you to understand the use cases and have the necessary background on the specifics of the regulatory environment, such as HIPAA or GDPR, in the right industries. It will also provide a basis for building KPIs, as insights will be needed. 

Investment opportunity 

A minimum viable product is one of the best arguments for potential investors. It can show how the development can succeed, whether the development team is relevant to the request and whether the business model is profitable. This will result in a technically feasible PoC with the potential for further scaling. For successful further investments, a successfully created MVP should demonstrate the functionality of an actual product. 

For example, it can be a prototype of mobile development with the most critical functions using Flutter or React Native. Similarly, a backend with a Node.js web platform and a MongoDB database will provide an understanding and further analysis of request processing speed. Thus, it will determine the technology stack and its prospects. 

In addition, the agile development approach to creating a minimum viable product will allow you to respond quickly to investors' comments and update the product quickly. This may vary depending on the niche in which the business operates, but the most common approach is adding a new feature using modular architecture and optimising performance through Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery. 

In any business, it is worth focusing on real needs, which is necessary at the initial stages of development, prototyping, MVP, or PoC. We have described these processes' differences in detail in the PoC, Prototype, or MVP case study. 

A plan for creating a successful MVP

In its work, the Artkai team follows a seven-stage MVP development process to ensure that it provides the client with a relevant strategy for building a successful business model. 

Idea and concept 

At this stage, our team works with the client's stakeholders to create a clear MVP vision and concept. As this is one of the most critical phases, we both understand that it is the basis for the product's success in its modernization or creation. To build the idea and, subsequently, the concept, we research the target audience to describe it further and identify the role, motives, and customer needs in detail. At this stage, we also identify the pain points to be solved. 

To achieve this, the team uses a SWOT analysis of market conditions and competitors to identify unique solutions and product ideas. It is also worth focusing on a certain set of core features that form the basis of a minimum viable product. To implement core features, you can use the must-have, should-have, could-have, and won't-have approach, which allows you to rank everything by priority. 

For a successful technical component, you should focus on creating a preliminary development architecture, considering business strategy and the future scaling process. For example, the technology stack should be clearly defined, such as PostgreSQL as a database, React for the front end, and Node.js for the back end. 

At the stage of presenting the idea and concept to the customer, a graphical visualization should guarantee a common vision between both business parties. The visualization should mainly be done as a platform prototype or Wireframe. For this purpose, Figma or Sketch are relevant tools. 

MVP design 

The following strategic step is to develop a minimum viable product design. This step should combine users' needs, current UI/UX principles, and the business goals of the client company. Creating a high-quality design involves a broad methodology, from analyzing user behavior to creating an interactive prototype of such interaction. The main components of the design process for MVPs are: 

MVP development

This step involves actual development with specific technology stacks, WCAG compliance, high interactivity, integrated design, development process, and subsequent testing. 

The choice of a technology stack should be tailored to meet the goals and needs of a particular project. Of course, there are popular technologies worth using to speed up the process and increase efficiency. However, the final decisions should be based on your product's individual characteristics and factors. 

For example, a popular choice for backend development is mainly Node.js, characterized by asynchronous processing and high performance. Also, when high scalability is needed for established business, cloud-native technologies such as AWS Lambda and the use of containers via Docker are chosen. For the frontend, we mainly use React or Vue.js. They are based on a component-based architecture. GitLab CI/CD provides integration. 

Quality assurance and testing 

The QA stage is vital for the product. It is the only way to detect defects and damages within the application and guarantee stable operation in the future. Considering the specifics of this process, there are different parts of the testing process, such as Unit Testing, Integration Testing, UAT—User Acceptance Testing, and Load Testing. 

Each of these parts is part of a multi-level process, which involves a combination of integration approaches, the involvement of a specific range of users, and a high degree of automation. 

MVP launch 

Launching a minimum viable product involves a technical release, monitoring user activity, collecting data, and ensuring that it is ready for user feedback and interaction.

After the MVP launch, it is recommended that user interaction and engagement be systematically tracked and analyzed. This will allow you to determine which features are most actively used. 

Also, qualitatively collected user feedback will provide a realistic vision of potential improvements and a basis for confirming or refuting hypotheses.

Dashboards and a structured approach to analyzing and collecting analytics should be the foundation for a high-quality minimum viable product. This will ensure that scaling issues are addressed. 

Improvement phase

 The improvement process is individual for each product and can be influenced by factors such as competitors' activities, user feedback, and systematic analysis. In modern IT, the approach to improvement is based on iterative development cycles with guided data analytics and metrics. 

The improvement process is based on collecting Feedback Loops from various sources and using analytical tools such as Google Analytics, Mixpanel, or Amplitude. In parallel, the collected data should be analyzed using a Data-Driven approach to identify key insights. To do this, it is better to work on clustering queries to identify pain points and evaluate changes by their complexity and importance. 

What to do next after the MVP? 

Once a service provider has created and presented an MVP, it's time to build on this interim success with further product development. MVP development services have three main components: iterative development, scaling, and feedback analysis. 

Iterative development 

This is the leading technical component that requires an experienced MVP development company to implement the needs and requirements of the client company and the current market conditions. Necessary documentation for this part is the creation of a project roadmap that will be adapted to the flexibility of market changes. 

Collecting and analyzing feedback 

The basis of systematic development is obtaining relevant information for your product, website, or service. It also involves specific methods of collecting feedback, such as interviews with specific customers, core user segmentation, and Net Promoter Score, to determine whether a customer would recommend a particular service. 

Scaling 

Scaling is transforming the basic version into a full-fledged one, considering all technical and organizational aspects. An important element of this process is adherence to the product architecture, whether a monolithic structure or a NoSQL database. As a result, it should lead to rapid deployment and transition to a microservice architecture. 

The key stage of scaling in the context of MVP can turn the beta version of your product into a full-fledged solution for further work. At the end of the process, the solution should be built to meet business strategy goals and optimize the overall architecture with adaptation to further improvements. 

To ensure the scaling process is successful, you must use platforms like Kubernetes to automate deployment when traffic grows significantly. It's also essential to prepare for increased load by integrating load balancers such as AWS Elastic Load Balancer or NGINX. This way, you can distribute requests between servers without compromising system stability during peak loads. 

For the global market, an essential element is to add localization to the website or application and use global data centers like Azure and AWS to guarantee availability. 

In our team's practice, there were many cases when our specialists proposed and created minimally viable products before the actual product development. One such development was the Red Rocks app for a financial institution with a full range of deposit and lending services, the features of which were described in detail in our Financial wellness app case study. 

The concept of the product was that it had no analogs on the market then, so it was a challenge for Artkai. As a result, a successfully developed MVP gave impetus to further product development, confirmed by positive feedback and high analytical indicators. 

The next project that we had experience with using MVPs was an e-learning platform for business schools. The main focus was to transform and modernize the e-learning platform for further use by business schools and universities. We described this in detail in the Innovative e-learning platform case study. 

As a result, the e-learning platform has been successfully launched and tested by thousands of business school students. Our team received only positive user feedback and great news from the client. The customer reported that several large business schools plan to integrate the newly developed software into the educational process.

Conclusions

Summing up the above points, we can say that MVP development is an important strategic point for many rapidly developing businesses in the market. It is an effective way to low risks and adjust the business to specific tasks. It is also one of the ways to successfully select a development company for further cooperation at the initial stages. 

Understanding the critical importance of this process in creating a high-quality product, the Artkai team strives to provide high-quality support for businesses in compliance with high standards and years of experience. We offer MVP Development Services so your company can quickly and efficiently test and implement your idea.