When is an MVP ready?

I’m glad that no- or low-code tools exist, but digital consumers are so used to rich experiences that simulating an app or platform via a glorified Google form isn’t going to provide anything remotely close to the insights that it would have a few years ago. Don’t get me wrong, you should loosely validate the problem space and value of even proceeding to R&D step 1, but you need to release something significantly more mature to truly understand the validity of your proposed solution. This is because while problems may be somewhat unidimensional, even simple solutions are always multidimensional, and concept validation MVPs fail to capture said dimensions. Skip this step.

Dimensions is purposely open-ended here. Brand, aesthetic, cost, competition, market, timing, time-to-value, complexity, voice, copy, discoverability…

While it requires significantly more effort, time, and — in many cases — capital than the type of dead-simple glorified test described above, you should instead focus on creating an MVP that encompasses as many relevant dimensions of the proposed solution as possible… and then take a deep breath and make it publicly discoverable with a single goal: Collecting initial user behavior insights. Not revenue. Not adoption.

This will hurt. Your name is going to be attached to something kind of bad, and you won’t be able to hide behind the “it’s just an initial concept validation” excuse.