Minimum Viable Product MVP Template
Validate assumptions and build products people will love with the Minimum Viable Product MVP Template.
About the Minimum Viable Product MVP Template
Bram Kanstein, a startup expert and product builder, developed the Minimum Viable Product MVP Template to help entrepreneurs talk about their products and refine their strategies. The format of this template is similar to the Business Model Canvas, and it serves as a guide to walk anyone through your product idea.
What’s the Minimum Viable Product MVP Template?
The Minimum Viable Product MVP Template is a framework developed to help any entrepreneur structure their approach to product development and business. In this template, you’ll find:
Customer segment
Value proposition
Channels
Customer engagement
Riskiest assumptions
Experiment format
Experiment scenario/workflow
Metrics
Success criteria
Results
Learning and insights
Next steps
With this framework, you’ll validate your business ideas and uncover opportunities.
Benefits of Minimum Viable Product MVP Template
With years of experience building startups from the ground up, Bram Kanstein identified some of the main struggles that entrepreneurs face. He built this template to solve the following:
Who’s the problem you are solving? Find out your target audience.
Where are your users, and how to find them?
How to make sure your product solves the proposed problem.
Find out if your business idea is viable.
Many people face these main pain points when developing a new product. The MVP template helps you structure the business idea, so you deliver a business plan, even at the early stages.
If you want to know more about how to build an MVP, check out Bram Kanstein’s video.
How to use the Minimum Viable Product MVP Template
Select the MVP template and add it to your board. You’ll find a minimum viable product example next to the empty template you’ll be working on.
Here are a few tips on how to fulfill each section of the template:
Your Customer Segment
Use the Target Audience Template to help you identify which segment of your target customers will gain the most value from your MVP.
Value Proposition
Craft your value proposition according to the template below:
My company, (insert of company)____, is developing (a defined offering) to help __ (a defined audience)(solve a problem) with (secret sauce/differentiation).
Channels
Use the Customer Touchpoint Map to define how you’ll reach your customers and deliver value.
Customer Engagement
Use the Jobs to be Done Template to help you find out how you will engage customers and learn from their experience with a User Research Template.
Riskiest Assumptions
What are you setting out to test with your MVP?
Are these assumptions about the Problem, Solution, or Implementation?
Use the Risk Assessment Template.
Experiment Format
What type of experiment are you going to run?
Organize them with the Growth Experiments Template.
Scenario Workflow
How does that work? Describe the steps from beginning to end.
Use the Production Workflow Template.
Metrics
What will you measure? (It can be multiple metrics)
Success Criteria
How do you qualify and/or quantify a successful outcome of this experiment?
Results
What are the qualitative and/or quantitative results of your experiment?
Learnings and Insights:
What are your key learnings?
What are your key surprises?
Did you get enough results?
What do they tell you about your Riskiest Assumption(s)?
Next Steps
What do the results tell you to do next?
Are you going to Pivot, Pursue, or Stop?
To help you define your next steps, run a retrospective.
What should an MVP include?
Your MVP should be a version of your product built with the minimum effort possible and still deliver value to the customers so that you can test your assumptions. Before you build your MVP, answer these questions: Whose problem do I want to solve? Is it a big enough problem to solve? If so, what’s the value proposition I should pitch to them? Where can I find and reach these people to validate my solution? After you manage to answer these questions, you can go ahead and build your MVP. Check all the necessary steps using our Minimum Viable Product Template.
Get started with this template right now.