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Hey, I'm one of the folks at YC working on Startup School. I wouldn't characterize our advice this way. It's important that an MVP actually solves a problem th

Hey, I'm one of the folks at YC working on Startup School. I wouldn't characterize our advice this way. It's important that an MVP actually solves a problem that a user has, although it's fine for it to require some manual intervention at first that you plan to automate away in the long term. That said, you should definitely be talking to potential users long before your MVP is ready, and one way to find potential users is by building an initial landing page and trying to get signups. Obviously, you should be upfront about the fact that the product doesn't exist yet if you choose to get user feedback in this way. You can see more in Michael's lecture on the topic: https://www.startupschool.org/videos/65 https://www.startupschool.org/videos/65

oblib 6y ago
Well, when I hear that I think of Theranos. I'm not an investor, but that approach feels a bit like putting the cart before the horse to me. For example, if I went to horse riders and asked them if they'd buy a saddle for $2000 that attached itself to a horse and could steer the horse based on GPS tech and follow built-in directions to anywhere they wanted to ride, and keep it from bucking or running off, they'd probably all say "heck yeah!" So, now that I've demonstrated market fit from that point I need to make a working prototype and if I haven't a clue but do have a good pitch to investors that convinces them I can do it I'm still not accomplishing anything (except maybe a short free ride). I'm sure investors are aware of this but Theranos proved they can be had and I think that approach is why and how they can be. But that's not really my side of the story. I want to make something first and then see if people will buy it. From that point of view the "V" in MVP seems most important and the minimal part is easy to described and easy to measure real progress on. So I do agree the initial goals for a product should be minimal, for example, maybe just a saddle that attaches itself to a horse to begin with. But even if we get a prototype done we still don't know if we have salable product, so really, this is where market fit comes face to face with a product and we truly start finding out what an MVP is. Finding that needs testing with a real product, but at least we've not blown a lot of cash on actual product viability and almost none on marketing.

oblib 6y ago

Well, when I hear that I think of Theranos. I'm not an investor, but that approach feels a bit like putting the cart before the horse to me. For example, if I went to horse riders and asked them if they'd buy a saddle for $2000 that attached itself to a horse and could steer the horse based on GPS tech and follow built-in directions to anywhere they wanted to ride, and keep it from bucking or running off, they'd probably all say "heck yeah!" So, now that I've demonstrated market fit from that point I need to make a working prototype and if I haven't a clue but do have a good pitch to investors that convinces them I can do it I'm still not accomplishing anything (except maybe a short free ride). I'm sure investors are aware of this but Theranos proved they can be had and I think that approach is why and how they can be. But that's not really my side of the story. I want to make something first and then see if people will buy it. From that point of view the "V" in MVP seems most important and the minimal part is easy to described and easy to measure real progress on. So I do agree the initial goals for a product should be minimal, for example, maybe just a saddle that attaches itself to a horse to begin with. But even if we get a prototype done we still don't know if we have salable product, so really, this is where market fit comes face to face with a product and we truly start finding out what an MVP is. Finding that needs testing with a real product, but at least we've not blown a lot of cash on actual product viability and almost none on marketing.