Define your MVP features in 4 steps

Launching with a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) can keep your costs managed and your product agile as you learn from your users. But we completely understand that you are probably so in love with all of your ideas, it feels impossible to decide what to hold back from your first iteration.

While it might be challenging to prioritise features, this simple process will help you to separate your critical core-value features from those that really can wait for future iterations.

‍STEP 1: Be clear about what problem you’re solving ‍

On a big piece of paper (or digital whiteboard equivalent if you prefer), write down who your users are, what the genuine problem is that you’re aiming to solve for them, and the top 3 user goals for your product. It’s important that your goals are simple and validated, and that you focus on a maximum of 3. Some examples of these user goals might be:

• Sign up for an online Psychology course
• Place a recurring order for monthly dog food
• Get a more cost-effective car insurance policy

Then write down your top 3 business goals. They can be altruistic (as long as they’re realistically achievable) or straight-up commercial. No one is judging! You’d be amazed at how difficult it can be for some clients to make one of their goals “make money”.

We can’t stress enough how important it is that these are aligned. If a user achieves their goals, will your business be achieving its goals? If the answer is no, stop and give it a re-think. If the answer is yes... stick that sheet up on a wall. 

‍STEP 2: Download your ideas‍

This is where you get to acknowledge and give credit to all the ideas you’ve ever had about your product by putting them down on paper. We’d suggest separating them into “Features” (things your product does or has) and “Tools” (things that help your users to do stuff). Just go for it without applying any mental filters at this stage. 

Stick that up on the wall next to your Goals sheet.

‍STEP 3: Map it out‍

Now we’re going to draw some good ol’ fashioned flow charts to map out User Journeys. 

• Write one of your user goals at the top of a page. 
• Start with where a user will arrive on your site, or in your product. 
• What do they need to do next?   
• And then? 
• And then?
• Until they achieve their goal in the simplest possible way. 

If there’s more than one necessary path for them to achieve their goal, map the various routes out. But you really want to avoid giving them too many ways to do the same thing as it can ultimately lead to confusion. Try your best to keep it clean. 

Do the same for each of your user goals, and… stick each of them up on the wall. 

‍STEP 4: Prioritise‍

Here comes the fun part. Go back to your ideas list, and mark the features and tools that would have been needed by your users to complete their Journeys in Step 3. That shortlist then becomes the basis of your MVP scope, and it’s likely that everything else can wait for a future phase.

Take a step back and look at your list. You may want to argue at this point that you really want a back-office billing system, but do you really need it right now? Can you process your first orders manually until you know that users actually want what you’re offering, and how you’re offering it? Then by all means, build it out when the revenue’s coming in or you’ve proven Product Market Fit. 

Of course, no one understands your domain like you do. But we’re challenging you to be critical about what you need to launch with to make sure you’re on the right track. Every feature you add to your scope will add significant cost and time to the project, and make it exponentially harder to pivot or experiment. So just make sure it’s an essential part of your core product value.

The simpler you can start out, the more you’ll be able to learn and iterate, and the better your product will be in the long run. Enjoy the journey of bringing it to life!‍

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Need help? 

Let’s chat about unpacking your MVP with a Discovery phase.

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