The process of app development is not a walk in the park. It has countless micro-processes that need to be effectively undertaken in order to ensure the best performance and UX.
Eighty-five percent of the users think that a firm’s website view on their phone should be better than the desktop. As a result, more and more people choose website builders like Wix to create a stunning, mobile-friendly websites that helps visitors navigate with ease.
Moreover, if the phone vibrates a little when a customer adds any product to their cart, it also comes under customer experience. These instances not only provide convenience but also become the USPs of the app. These features and many others need to be added in the discovery phase of the project.
In this post, we will take a comprehensive look at the importance of UX when developing a Minimum Viable Product, or MVP.
Before We Dive into the Role of User Experience
An MVP is an initial product with some basic features made available to early customers. The core motive of developing an MVP is to get valuable inputs regarding the future development of the product.
The MVP Approach wasn’t Designed for:
If you are developing an MVP, make sure you align your goals well. Never develop an MVP because of the following:
1. To Develop a Useless App at a Low Cost
Never rush the MVP development process while creating an app. As the process will help you develop the best initial version of your product, it is necessary to give it time.
Moreover, it is necessary to make sure that you plan your budget first. Investing a little more into MVP can lead to remarkable results in the future, so don’t just focus on cost-saving.
Plus, an MVP can help you save a lot more in the future.
2. To Build a “Utopian” yet Subpar Version of a Product
Another thing that you need to keep in mind while developing an MVP is that you are not developing an industry marvel currently. You are just developing a product version for analyzing the reviews of the audience.
Hence, you need to focus on a limited set of features around which the functionality of the app revolves.
3. To Make a Quick Profit after Low-Cost Development
If we talk about the app development cost, the price range of developing an app is between $10,000 to $240,000. So if you think that you will get sky-high profit by spending pennies on development, you are wrong.
An MVP should be developed properly with enough budget in mind.
The MVP Approach was Designed for:
Along with knowing the don’ts related to the MVP, it is necessary to know why you need an MVP. Here is why:
1. To Test Product Hypotheses in Terms of the Real Market
There are various ways to research the market through surveys, focus groups, interviews, and whatnot. These aspects will inform you about what people need and what problems they face. On the other hand, if you are developing a product MVP, it will help you learn how people interact with the product and what else you can add as per market requirements. Hence, an MVP is the best way to analyze the real market scenario.
2. To Find a Value/Demand Fit
As per Failory, 34% of the startups fail due to the lack of product fit market.
Hence, it becomes essential for you to develop an MVP to know what kind of product fits the market and what the market needs.
Moreover, an MVP will also help you find out if it can be scaled into a comprehensive product or not.
3. To Scale Value to Find a Product/Market Fit
One more reason for which an MVP is important is to know if the product can be scaled or not.
Hence, depending on the market response of the MVP, you can find out if you want to develop the product further or not.
Note: Premature scaling is the number one reason for the failure of the startup.
What Is the Role of UX in MVP?
User experience is by far the most important thing that you need to consider while building an MVP.
This does not mean that you need to embed all the UX features into the MVP, but you should include some of the basic ones.
There are countless UI/UX trends that you can check out while building an MVP.
Here are some of the factors that define the importance of an MVP:
Test the Initial Product
If we talk about the initial product or an MVP, it needs to be tested properly before launching. Moreover, before testing, you also need to make sure that you have included all the basic and essential features in it.
For example, include features like quality pictures, dark mode, and others to enhance user experience. After all, UX is what makes an individual the regular user of your app.
The core motive of all this is to know how to improve your product further to offer a top-notch user experience.
Non-obvious UX Patterns
Now, while designing an app, it is possible that you may miss some little aspects that hinder the user experience. For example, the presence of fake preloaders, infinite scrolling, hamburgers, etc., can sometimes irritate a user.
Hence, to analyze these UX patterns that affect the performance of the app, an MVP is necessary. You can record these patterns and work on improving them. You can add:
- a sliding hamburger,
- Fixed Position Menu Web UI,
- Card Grid,
- and many more!
Validate These in Customer Interviews
Lastly, when you have discovered UX patterns in your app that are not required, it is time for validation. This can be done in customer interviews.
For this, you need to interview customers and gain insights about patterns and potential solutions.
Why Is UX Leading in MVP Development?
Along with having a key role in MVP development, UX has also become a primary factor for designing websites and apps.
Here are some crucial aspects for which UX has become a benchmark for developers and businesses.
- UX-led MVPs are cheaper to build because they don’t require fancy UI. Now, the very first thing that motivates businesses to build an MVP is that they don’t have to focus much on the user interface.
It means that you can develop an app with minimal graphics and a bit less image quality. But, you need to focus on delivering content swiftly and ensure less response time.
In short, with less focus on UI, you get to work more on UX. Thus, reducing cost and saving time.
- UX-led MVP focuses on numbers. Unlike UI, UX-led MVP helps in boosting the customer base. How?
UX directly affects the psychology of the person. Hence, it is necessary for designers to know about some essential principles to get through to the audience.
The more you will know, the more will be the diversity in the design, and more will be the number of users.
- UX-led MVP helps to build a strong community. At the end, when your UX-led MVP is out. The early adopters will be your most loyal users.
And they will help you build a wider community of the app or any other product. Thus, helping you build a strong and loyal community.
Wrapping Up
It is no wonder why Amazon or Instagram has millions of daily users. We all know that customer experience is their primary motive, and they do everything in their power to keep up with their audience.
Hence, if you are a startup and thinking of launching a product, focus on how to do it better than others rather than just doing it. Focusing on UX can take you way ahead of your competitors.
