No idea – not a sketch or works-on-paper – survives intact to sales or reality. Your first pragmatic step from concept to reality is a minimum viable product (MVP). It’s real, it works, and it proposes an actual product that meets a demonstrable need in its market. But what does just enough functionality look like? And what is the rationale for promising only just enough?

Your MVP isn’t a beta version; it’s not a proving ground for bug-finding or a proof-of-concept; it’s a real product that actually works. It does, however, actually pay to be only minimally viable. An MVP is a way of defining the smallest set of features that can deliver immediate value. It’s creating a product that a customer will pay for today, maybe with their wallet or information. Here’s how to determine your MVP and do it right.

🎢 Start with the right questions. Dead simple, tough questions are the proven way to create a great MVP. Minimum doesn’t mean easy. It means starting hard, working smart, and asking lots of questions. 

⏳ Test your idea before writing a single line of code. Detail your idea, test it, get reactions, validate interest and demand. Talk with a small group – learn what you can, get opinions, pass along feedback. Use insights to build features – but discard all feedback from the loudest 20 per cent.

🪤 Engage in customer interviews and talk with prospective users. Ask users what they want, and listen to their responses because it’s gold. Follow real user actions. Use software to track people using your product. Observe clicks, movements, and scrolls. It’s all data that helps shape your MVP. 

🎮 Study the competition. See what they are good at. Identify their failures. See what they are doing to find customers. See what they are doing to fix or improve their offering. VCs recommend competitive analysis as a key step.

🛼 Back your MVP with market data. Learn the features customers want, and start with core functionality. An MVP has the skeleton of a product but is built only to the extent that it meets basic needs and provides value.

🛟 Keep collecting information. Do so and collect signal data ahead of and during the build to maximize your chances of product-market fit. Your MVP should be adequately well-shaped in terms of learnability, feasibility and usability. 

After all, an MVP is not perfect. MVP is all about creating something valuable with minimal effort and budget. Your MVP is your first Baby Step to going from your brilliant idea to a shining star product. Go out to the market, test it, build it, and repeat.