How to Effectively Test Your MVP
DESCRIPTION
I welcome Phuong back for her first appearance in 2024, where she shares insights on effectively conducting user testing for MVPs. We discuss the importance of learning from customer behavior, gathering a small group of dedicated users, setting clear objectives, tracking engagement metrics, and using various feedback methods like observing user interactions and conducting interviews and surveys. We emphasize the need to iterate based on user feedback and avoiding falling in love with the product over solving the identified problem. I aim to underscore the importance of solving for "no" rather than seeking only positive outcomes. Phuong highlights the significance of sticking to validated pain points and suggests silently observing users to understand their true interactions with the product. Overall, it's a valuable discussion on the iterative process of refining MVPs based on user feedback.
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TRANSCRIPT (this is an automated transcript):
MPD: Welcome everybody. I'm Mark Peter Davis, managing partner of Interplay. I'm on a mission to help entrepreneurs advance society. And this podcast is definitively part of that effort. Today, we've got Phuong back for her first appearance in 2024 providing some wisdom and great insight about how to effectively conduct user testing.
Once you get the MVP built. She nails it as always, so let's jump right in and here's Phuong.
Phuong, great to see you. Hey, how did we get two months into this year and you've somehow weaseled out of doing any podcast so far?
Phuong: How did that happen? I don't know, I wasn't asked, so I feel like you had other stuff going on or other guests. Are there partners that have better things to say? I think we got to
MPD: talk to the producer, Will.
Will is the person who's responsible for everything at Underply. Actually, everything that's bad is my fault,
Phuong: right? Could be. Maybe you're not prioritizing learning about testing your MVP enough.
MPD: Okay, here we are. We're back. Phuong's hot and in the saddle and she's gonna teach us something. All right, drum roll everybody.
Let's go
Phuong: awesome. Yeah, i'm gonna talk about mvps today. I guess I left the cat out of the bag so on previous episodes, we had talked about validating your product idea and then building your MVP. But then once you have that, then what? Today, we're going to talk about testing your MVP.
Now, the main purpose of this initial testing is to learn as much as possible about customer behavior and how users are using your products. You're trying to assess if your product is solving the pain point you've identified, and if it's not, why not? How do you get your product to a place where it's solving that pain point?
Start by gathering your task group, and I know it sounds counterintuitive, but I think the best way here is to start small. Having a small number of users who really love your product is better at this early stage than having A lot of people who just like your product or, we're using it, but not really these initial users can be really powerful if you are able to create a relationship with them and then take them on your journey with you, we forget this, but not that many people get to interact and influence product at this stage.
We take it for granted, but it's really cool for most people to be able to interact with the creator of a product and then tell them their thoughts on the product and how to make it better and then actually have that implemented. And that feedback for founders is invaluable. So I think everybody wins here.
So how do you find these people? I get this question a lot and I think there are a lot of good sources. First is your personal network. It's your friends, your family, your colleagues. These people are probably the most willing to participate in testing, but they're probably the most likely to give you false positives.
They'll tell you what you want to hear because they don't want to hurt your feelings. So you have to be extra diligent about getting honest feedback from them and then take that feedback with a grain of salt Also, you can look at online communities. So joining groups related to your product Or your industry on reddit linkedin and other specialized forums and then, social media networking if you started an account for your company and have a following, or you can also use your own personal social media account.
Once you have these users, you can also do a referral program to encourage them to introduce their friends. After you have these users, you have to set your objectives. What are the KPIs you're tracking? And what does success look like for a lot of? Businesses. These early KPIs are focused around engagement.
Obviously, it's not around revenue or acquisition or anything like that. You really want to understand how testers are using the product. Are they using all of the product or only certain aspects of it? And are there places in the user journey where they're dropping off? Have a consistent strategy on how you're gathering the analytics on usage, depending on what your product is.
A lot of there are a lot of tools you could use. Google Analytics, Mixpanel, Hotjar, tons. But of course, just looking at the numbers isn't going to be enough. You have to understand the story behind the numbers by talking to the users. This is where that relationship you've built with them will be really helpful.
And when you're getting user feedback, make sure you're using multiple touch points and methods so you're getting the whole picture. So this could be, more intimate interactions, like observing them while they're using the product. And when they're doing this, do it a couple of times with each person.
Do it the first time don't say anything, don't interfere so you can get a real sense of how they're interacting with the product. Then do another round where you're asking them questions as they're moving through the journey so you understand why they're doing what they're doing and what they think about each part of the product.
And then depending on the number of users you have, you can also layer in interviews and surveys. And these can from a handful of questions. You don't really want to ask them. Too many questions was people just won't do it or just ask a simple NPS score. How likely are you to recommend this on a scale of 0 to 10?
Something like that, then using all this information, assess what's working and what's not working in your MVP. Is it solving the pain point? If not, what features does it need in order to do so identify the changes that you need and iterate on your product. So it addresses what the customer wants. Then the last thing I want to say about this is that in this iteration stage, Remember, you're iterating on the product, and that seems obvious because we've been talking about this for the last, two minutes, but a lot of founders fall in love with their product, and when they realize it's not solving the problem, they often change the problem to fit the product, and then now you're trying to solve a problem that hasn't been validated, so it may not even be a problem at all, and, that's not good for anyone.
Yeah,
MPD: they, I love that last bit, Phuong, because they, there's this psychology where people are solving for a yes. They're solving for a positive outcome And you have to actually respond to what the market's telling you, right? If the market tells you what you're doing is useless, don't waste your time.
That's okay. That's not a personal judgment. That just means you're, you picked the wrong spot, pick another one. And maybe you change your product. Maybe you change the entire damn concept. But the solving for yes is a very dangerous psychological phenomenon. I think it is the most common. Instinctual way to approach startups.
And I think we're taught that you don't give up all this stuff. That doesn't mean you solve for yes, you should be solving for no as much as possible and trying to find that vacuuming all of the market.
Phuong: Yeah, and I think if you do your initial validation correctly, when you're validating your pain point and, and you get a lot of feedback that is an actual pain point.
That's a problem you're trying to solve. Don't veer from it, right? That's going to be your guiding point. The other thing I
MPD: love, just wanted to add to this is. Watching people use a product, right? Getting their feedback and what they think super helpful, but it's going through a lot of filters.
If you just sit quietly, don't interrupt, don't say anything, don't even answer their questions and just watch them use the product. You'll pretty quickly figure out. What you got wrong and what's useful and what's not. Anyway, fun, awesome session as always. Welcome back and thank you.
All right, Phuong on point as always. I think we can, Phuong's basically writing a book on how to build a company through all these segments. Maybe that'll be a montage down the road. Anyway, for listening. And we'll catch you again next week.
Phuong: Hope you're well.
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