How to build a minimum viable product: Everything you need to know to get started

You’ve got a big idea. But before you invest in full-scale development, you need to know if your product is something your target audience will actually want. That’s where a minimum viable product (MVP) comes in.

Building an MVP helps you test the waters with just the essentials, so you can validate your idea quickly, reduce risk, and start gathering feedback. But how do you build one? Let’s break it down step-by-step.

MVP explained

An MVP is not just a “smaller version” of your final product. It’s a version with enough functionality to attract early adopters and gather critical insights. It helps you avoid the common pitfall of overbuilding and gives you the opportunity to focus on what matters most to your users.

Your MVP should answer these key questions: - What problem does my product solve? - What are the core features necessary to address that problem? - What feedback am I trying to gather to improve the product?

Ultimately, building an MVP is all about learning. You’re releasing a lean version of your product to understand how users interact with it and what you should do next.

How to build the MVP: Here are the stages you need to know

Building an MVP isn’t a one-size-fits-all process, but there are clear stages that successful MVPs share. Let’s walk through them.

Dive into market research: understand your audience

The first step to building an MVP is knowing who you’re building it for. You want to make sure there’s a demand for your idea and that it resonates with your target audience. This is where market research comes in.

Start by analyzing your competitors, looking for gaps in their offerings, and identifying the pain points your product could solve. Tools like surveys, interviews, and analytics platforms can help you dig into customer needs.

Use Miro’s Customer Journey Map template to visually map out your customer’s experience, from identifying their problem to finding your product as a solution. This will give you a clear perspective on where your MVP fits in and how it can provide value right away.

Ideation and brainstorming: turn ideas into actionable features

After you’ve validated your idea through research, it’s time to brainstorm. This is where you and your team can get creative, thinking about the features and functionalities your MVP will need.

In this phase, collaboration is key. Bring in cross-functional teams—designers, developers, product managers—to brainstorm and refine your idea. Miro’s collaboration tools make this process simple, whether you’re working together in real-time or asynchronously. Use sticky notes to gather thoughts, voting features to prioritize ideas, and comments to keep track of feedback from everyone.

One quick tip: Don’t overload your MVP with features. Stick to solving your core problem with just a few must-have functionalities. Less is more at this stage.

Building your user flow: define how users will engage with your product

Once you’ve brainstormed your MVP’s key features, it’s time to define how users will interact with them. Creating a user flow helps you map out the steps users take within your product—from landing on the homepage to completing an action, like making a purchase or signing up for a service.

Miro’s Wireframe Templates and Prototyping Tools are incredibly useful at this stage. They allow you to sketch out your product’s structure and see how each element connects. It’s a fast, visual way to figure out whether your MVP’s design will deliver the right user experience. And because Miro integrates with tools like Figma, you can quickly move from brainstorming to design without breaking your workflow.

Feature prioritization: focus on the essentials

Here’s the hard part—deciding what stays and what goes. Feature prioritization is all about cutting through the noise and focusing on what’s essential to solve your customer’s problem.

Rank your features based on their impact versus effort. Miro’s Kanban Boards and Product Roadmap Templates make it easy to visualize and prioritize your features in a clear, actionable way. By organizing your features into categories—must-have, nice-to-have, and can-wait—you’ll ensure your MVP is lean and focused on delivering maximum value with minimal resources.

And remember, this isn’t set in stone. As you gather feedback, you can adjust your feature prioritization based on real user insights.

Launch and measure: gather feedback and iterate

Now, it’s time to put your MVP in front of users. The goal here isn’t perfection—it’s learning. Once you’ve launched your MVP, start collecting feedback from early adopters.

Use tools like Miro’s feedback threads and voting features to gather insights on what users like, what they’re struggling with, and what needs improvement. This will give you the data you need to iterate quickly and make informed decisions about what to build next.

Don’t forget to track performance metrics. Whether it’s user engagement, retention, or specific conversion rates, measuring your MVP’s performance will help you determine if you’re on the right path or need to pivot.

Take your MVP to the next level with Miro

Your MVP is the starting point for something much bigger—and Miro is here to help you take it to the next level. Our innovation workspace makes it easy for teams to collaborate in real-time or asynchronously, ensuring that your product development process remains agile, flexible, and inclusive of everyone’s input.

With Miro, you can:

• Use visual project management tools like Gantt charts and Kanban boards to keep your MVP development on track. Also, discover additional product management templates.

• Seamlessly integrate with your existing tools like Jira, Slack, and Google Drive to streamline workflows.

• Create and iterate on designs with wireframing and prototyping tools, ensuring that your product is built with user experience in mind.

• Easily collect feedback using comments and voting features, so you can prioritize the next steps in your product development based on real data.

Whether you’re in the early stages of ideation or refining your product after launch, Miro provides the platform you need to collaborate effectively and iterate quickly.

Ready to start building your MVP? Try Miro today and unlock the potential of your next big idea.