In this article you will know what is Lean Startuphow it will help you get your minimum viable product and why it is essential for all entrepreneurs.
We live in the age of entrepreneurship, There is no doubt about that, and there is also no doubt about the fact that, day after day, a large number of companies close their doors because, for X or Y reasons, their product or service it was not good enough to stay afloat in the market.
The reality of things is that starting a business is 100 times more complicated than it seems, and “failure” (which could well be a area of opportunity to learn and improve) of many entrepreneurs, it is because they jump into the sea without knowing how to swim or without having the support of a lifeguard.
Fortunately, there is a methodology created by the entrepreneur and entrepreneurship expert eric ries called Lean Startup, whose main objective is to help emerging companies to develop their business ideas with the lowest possible margin of risk. So if you are interested in learning more about it, we recommend you continue reading this article.
What is a Lean Startup and how does it work?
Lean Startup It is a set of procedures that allow you, as an entrepreneur, to evolve your business idea and launch your product or service to the market with a high percentage of success, always taking into account that for this you must work under the scheme of “creation-measure-learning”.
To better understand this let’s take an example:
Suppose you want develop an app, so that through it people can make their purchases without the need to leave home. However, when you put it to work, you realize that the percentage of downloads is much lower than you expected.
Thinking of your idea, you developed a hypothesis based on the belief that people do not have the necessary time to make their purchases; but you didn’t take into account the fact that many of them prefer to go to the mall in person because they like to choose what they need, as well as compare prices and do a little snooping to see if they can take advantage of a good deal.
So does that mean you idea is it bad? Of course not, you’ve just ruled out the hypothesis that people don’t take the time to go shopping, and now that you’ve “created, measured and learned”, you can improve your proposal to meet the real needs of your potential market.
Experiment to reinvent.
Once it is understood that most of the initial ideas of a project are based on one or more hypothesisThe methodology Lean Startup He suggests that you should take those that you consider to be the most risky for action; generating experiments in an agile and economical way to be able to discern between what is functional and what is not.
In this way you will have the possibility of obtain very useful information for your businesswhich will help you define more clearly and concisely what is the value proposition that your product or service is providing to your customers, and greatly reducing the bad investment in terms of time and money.
The time has come to launch your Minimum Viable Product on the market.
Now that you have discarded and improved all the initial hypotheses of your startup through multiple experiments, it is time to create a prototype with the essential characteristics that your market has found valuable; or what in the Lean Startup methodology is known as a “Minimum Viable Product”.
East minimum viable productmore than a prototype, it will be a tool that will help you measure the adaptation and acceptance of your product or service in the market in a more precise way. In addition, it will allow you to have an overview of the real value that your potential customers perceive in what you are offering them.
Among the many advantages of launching on the market a minimum viable product the following stand out:
- make sure there will be potential buyers waiting for our service or product.
- To learn the maximum and risk the minimum.
- know the real needs market and take advantage of them to generate something of value.
- Define clear, measurable and achievable objectives to get closer and closer to the ideal product or service for consumers.
- find your star niche.
Roughly speaking, with your minimum viable product you can be sure that you will not spend months and thousands of pesos on something that people do not want to buy; Well, the idea is that with this prototype you can reinforce the positive hypotheses you had when making your experiments.
And without a doubt, the most valuable part of this step will be the feedback that you will receive from your future clients, such as their preferences; the way they want your product or service to solve their problems; how do you want it to be user experience; etc.
Business ideas they pop up in droves every day, and unfortunately many of them die during their maturation process, but by following the right methodology, a startup can be more successful than expected.
And remember, if you are really interested in creating your own business, you can read our book “How to create a company while working: Discover how to manage your time, manage your money and motivate yourself while creating a company and working for another” , where you will find all the information you need to found your own company, without having to leave your job.
