90% Of Founders Can't Build Successful MVP: Don't Be One | End of SaaS Is Closer | VC Remote Jobs & More
90% Of Founders Can't Build Successful MVP: Don't Be One | End of SaaS Is Closer | VC Remote Jobs & More
Building MVP Using Y-Combinator Strategy | End of SaaS Is Closer Than You Think | VC Remote Jobs
📢 Today At A Glance
Focus On: Building MVP Using Y-Combinator Strategy
Major News In Startups: KKR launched a $3B Third Fund For Growth Startups, Sequoia Faces Scrutiny Over China Investment & More
This Week’s Must Reading on Startups, Venture Capital & Technology
Venture Capital Remote Jobs & Internships: From Scout to Partner
🤝In Partnership With : Seed Scout
Scale Your Investor Network With Seed Scout💡
Fundraising can be a real challenge. Cold emails?
They often feel like throwing darts in the dark. And missing out on opportunities just because you can’t get that crucial investor call? It’s frustrating!
Introducing Seed Scout :
A friend who knows all the right investors and is ready to introduce you. That’s Seed Scout: to bridge the gap between you and those investors you’ve been dreaming of.
🤝 Advertise in The Venture Crew’s Newsletters
Want to promote your startup to my community of 14,000+ entrepreneurs and investors? Reply “advertise” and I’ll share my media kit.
📢 Building MVP Using Y-Combinator Strategy
When it comes to building a startup, one of the things that comes to a founder’s mind is creating a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) to test whether their solution to a particular problem is valid or not. However, one of the common mistakes I observe founders making is forgetting about the "Viable" part and just focusing on the product.
This common mistake is observed in 90% of startup founder and the rest 10% of founders who knows how to build MVP becomes startup like Airbnb, twich & stripe etc.
Also, most of the founders mistaken the meaning of MVP - that it’s about considering one feature and building a product. Actually - It’s more than that!
So - In this, we will deep dive into -
Real Meaning of Building Minimal Viable Product (MVP)
How did Airbnb, Twitch, and Stripe build their MVPs?
How did these startups use the Y-Combinator MVP building strategy?
How can you build the MVP for your startup?
So grab your coffee and let’s deep dive into it!
Source: Google Images
What is an MVP?
Minimum Viable Product.
A minimum viable product (MVP) is a version of a product with just enough features to be usable by early customers …— Wikipedia
What should be your MVP mindset In the Pre-Launch Stage?
Source: Y-Combinator Website
Let’s start with the meme above. It’s called the midwit meme.
Many first-time founders (the guy to the left of the bell curve) launch quickly and iterate (continue launching quickly). This is the same for the expert founder (the guy to the right of the bell curve).
But the guy in the middle is the “smart founder”. Let’s call him Benny. Benny wants to do surveys, raise money, build a team, etc. He wants to do it all. Benny learns after a while he should have been like the “dumb guys”.
As a founder, you want to build an MVP, get it to customers, and learn if it helps them or not. Then iterate.
You only really start learning about your users when you put a product in front of them. Not by doing 1000 surveys, and gathering a mailing list, or fundraising for half a year.
The amazing thing, your MVP might not even work how you want it to.
Your goal as an early-stage founder:
Launch quickly. (MVP)
Get your first customers.
Talk To Customers & Get Feedback
Iterate (Improve the product)
These goals need to be your guiding principle.
Expect that after 3–5 iterations, your MVP would have changed so much. But that’s a good thing. It means you’ve been listening to your customers.
Try and remember that you are not the hero of your customer’s story. You’re not Harry Potter, you’re Dumbledore who gives him the tools to be the hero of his own story.
You serve at the pleasure of the customer.
Is an MVP really the way to go?
Many founders want to build a product (like the iPhone) that blows people out of the water at once. That’s a very steep hill to climb though.
The MVP approach is best. You might have a question that -
But What If My MVP Is Rubbish and they Never Want To Talk To Me Again?
Even the biggest startups had this same fear. YC deals with it every time. It’s okay that you feel this fear. But never act on it.
FEAR- False Expectations Appearing Real
Think about it. If one customer doesn’t like your product, does that kill your startup? No. You can reach out to another customer. You can reach out to the same customer after you’ve made the product better.
The more amazing thing is that most people who speak with startups at an early stage are early adopters. They try out products that are in their rubbish phase. They are used to products not working quite as well as they should.
Early users usually have a problem. They are the only ones brave enough to try untested products that could solve the problem. They are usually there for the long haul to give you feedback on how to make the product better.
Fake Steve Jobs
These types of founders think they know exactly what the customer needs. Let’s call them fake Steves.
In their minds, Steve Jobs built the iPhone and iPod, such amazing products in one go. The mistake they're making is that’s not true. Many of them remember the 3rd or 4th iteration of these products. The first iPhone had 2G internet, no app store, etc.
You don’t know what the customer needs. The customer alone knows what they need. If you ask them, they will tell you. How you ask them is by showing them your MVP.
Examples of Successful MVPs
1. Airbnb:
Resource: Y-combinator Website
This is the first version of AirBnB. They didn’t have a lot of features. If you were an early adopter, here was what you enjoyed.
No payment system.
No map view. You couldn’t see where the house was in the city.
You had to sleep on an airbed. The whole house could not be rented to you.
It was only for conferences.
2. Twitch:
Twitch was the world's leading video platform and community for gamers.
Resource: Y-Combinator Website
They began as Justin TV with one page.
Only 1 streamer, Justin.
Their video was low res.
But they’re now one of the most popular streaming websites in the world.
Do you know what thing they focused on at the pre-launch stage?
Software MVP
Very fast to build (weeks not months)
Very limited functionality
Appeal to a small set of users
They built a product that people loved, not one that everyone loved. It didn’t solve all the problems. Solve problems step by step.
Who Are These Early Adopters? Why Do They Want To Go Through So Much Pain?
You want to build your product for customers who have their hair on fire.
If your hair is on fire like the beautiful young lady above, what product would you want to buy from me?
Maybe a hose, bucket of water, or something that can bring water. Well, all I have is a brick (my MVP). Walking away won’t even cross your mind. You’re desperate, you’ll buy the brick and hit yourself on the head to kill the fire.
The early adopters are the desperate ones.Forget the ones that are not desperate.
Why surveys don’t work
You might have had a formal business school education. Now you’re thinking let’s do a survey and learn everything the user needs. Then we build it.
That won’t work either.
The customer doesn’t know everything about the answer to their problem. They don’t even know everything about the problem itself. If they did, don’t you think they would build the solution on their own or hire people to do it for them?
It’s your job to know.
Surveys help you find out your users' pain but not how to solve it. Only a product can do that.
You give them a product and ask, does this solve your problem? Yes or no and
you go down the scientific method flow chart from there.
How To Build An MVP Quickly!
Set a specific deadline for completion.
Give yourself a timeframe. It’s easier to move on if you do. If you allow endless time to build, you’ll never stop building the MVP.
Write down the MVP features.
Don’t keep doing a double take while building. Write everything you want to build down now. Then you won’t have to rethink everything later.
Cut unnecessary features.
At this point, you will cut many features. Think how important is this to solve the user’s problem.
A startup to solve overseas payments doesn't need a chat feature in the MVP. Neither does it need APIs connected to every bank in the world. Both are important but can be skipped for the MVP.
Don’t fall in love with your MVP.
Have you heard married couples say something like: this is not the person I married or fell in love with?
Please please please don’t fall in love with your MVP.
It will change so much as you’re iterating.
If you’re in love with it, you won't want it to change. You’re building an emotional barrier to your growth.
Final Thoughts
It’s better to have 100 customers that really love your product than 100k that are just ok with it.
— Michael Seibel, Y-Combinator
Those 100 will give you rich feedback that you need to grow. Build for them and the others will come when you have a shiny product.
All these thoughts covered in a Y-Combiantor Video by Michael Seibel, Y-Combinator! You can watch that video too:
🤝 Advertise in The Venture Crew’s Newsletters
Want to promote your startup to my community of 14,000+ entrepreneurs and investors? Reply “advertise” and I’ll share my media kit.
📰 This Week’s Major News: VC & Massive Funding Updates
KKR launched a $3B Third Fund For Growth Startups Read Here
Sequoia faces congressional scrutiny over investments in China Read Here
Venture capital management fees have dipped to the lowest level since 2017 Read Here
Harvard Gains 2.9% as Venture Capital Drags Returns at Endowments Read Here
Early-stage founders are optimistic about raising again Read Here
Subscribed To, VC Daily Digest Newsletter and join 4000+ Avid Readers For Daily Morning Venture Insights, Funding Updates And Startup Stories In Your Inbox. 🚀
🗞️ Weekend’s Read On: Startup, Technology & VC
Why Silicon Valley Works By Sam Altman Read More (Venture Capital & Startups)
The Babe Ruth Effect in Venture Capital Read More (Venture Capital)
The End of SaaS Is Closer Than You Think Read More (Venture Capital & Startups)
Superlinear Returns By Paul Graham Read More (Startups)
Make a Product a Few Love, Not Many Like, At The Start. Why? Read More (Startups & Venture Capital)
Join 7000+ Founders, VCs and startup Enthusiasts Getting Tactical To Build, Learn and Implement Startups, Technology and Venture Capital.
💼 Venture Capital Remote Jobs & Internships
First Round Capital - Analyst | USA - Apply Here
Investment Analyst - Flashpoint | Remote - Apply Here
VC Fellowship - SucSEED Venture Partners | India - Apply Here
Analyst - ATM Capital | Singapore - Apply Here
Venture Team Internship - Connecticut | USA - Apply Here
Operating Partner - 7% Venture | Remote - Apply Here
Partner - a16z | US - Apply Here
Principal - Aartha Venture | India - Apply Here
Working Student Venture Capital | Germany - Apply Here
Hiring For Analyst/Associate Role For US Based Sector Agnostic Fund: VC Crafters
One of our network’s VC firms hiring for an Analyst/Associate role for two years. Our Community is helping them to hire for this role. If you are interested and want to know more about this Job opportunity, feel free to join our community.
📦 Share VC’s Newsletter
Refer a friend to gain access to our venture resources. 🎊
Get Venture Capital and Investors Database. for 4 referrals
Get Access To private Slack for 10 referrals
Get On a 30-minute call for 15 referrals ( To Discuss fundraising, breaking into VC funds, making a pitch deck, building a newsletter and others)
✍️Written By Sahil | Venture Crew Team