How the Lean Startup Method Can Carry Your App to Success
Many businesses today are plagued by a variety of issues. Their product cycles are too long or they don’t know enough about their market which leads to bad products that take a long time to launch.
Worse still, these products don’t always fill the needs of the customers. This can result in costly failures but with the customer focused strategies of the lean startup method this can be a thing of the past.
What is The Lean Startup Method?
Pioneered by entrepreneur Eric Ries in his book The Lean Startup, he suggests that startups should minimise their risks and shorten development cycles by aiming to meet the needs of early customers.
The Lean Startup recommends business-hypothesis-driven experimentation and putting together iterative product releases. In doing this, customers’ needs are catered to and teams can gather information in order to fine tune each release and it also scraps expensive project funding.
With these products less likely to fail due to the market research supporting them, the lean startup method is perfect for any team not looking to take too much of a risk.
How Does the Lean Startup Method Work?
It all begins with an MVP (Minimum Viable Product).
An MVP is defined by Ries as the “version of a new product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort”. Its goal is to test a business hypothesis or assumption to allow people (or the person behind it) get on the road to production asap.
Zappos founder Nick Swinmurn used this to test the hypothesis that customers wanted to buy shoes online. Swinmurn took photos of shoes in shoe stores, posted them online and then bought the shoes from the store at full price before selling them to customers directly.
In doing this Swinmurn had actual proof that the market was ready for his venture and this was the basis for the multi-billion dollar business.
Continuous Deployment Can Shorten Product Cycles
For those working on apps it may not seem like this method applies but combined with continuous deployment it can be the perfect strategy.
Continuous deployment suggests that all new code developed for an app should be deployed immediately to shorten development cycles.
For example, if users have been requesting a new feature that you are unsure of, deploying it allows you to get feedback right away. Following this, developers can fix it and roll out a new and improved version of the feature that users can celebrate and enjoy.
Strength In Statistics
But what happens when you have lots of features that need to be tested beforehand? Lean development teams like EL Passion can help bring these ideas and features to fruition in your app. You can also use A/B testing and actionable metrics to gather data on which of these features is the most promising to help you make a final decision.
A/B testing (or split testing) is the principle that you should put different versions of something in the customers’ hands and see which one they like best. Knowing ‘which one they like best’ isn’t always going to be a massive help but this is where actionable metrics come in.
For app developers that might be how many people use the new feature, how it impacts in-app monetisation and how app usage changes. For each app and team these actionable metrics will be different as the data will suggest different things about what you need to change but it’s important that you do consider them because they inform a lot about your audience.
How to Solve a Problem Like a Lean Startup
When tweaking and deploying features, there’s a small chance that overall users might not like it or that you find the business is losing focus.
The lean startup method solves this using pivot, a “structured course correction designed to test a new fundamental hypothesis about the product, strategy, and engine of growth.”
Groupon used the pivot strategy, turning the key idea that people like taking part in group actions from an activist platform into a multi-billion dollar coupon business.
Build, Measure, Learn
At its core, the lean startup method depends on Build-Measure-Learn. You turn an idea into a product (build), measure how well it performs (measure) and use the data gathered to improve, continue or pivot in the future (learn).
Customer focused, the lean startup helps you cater to your audience perfectly. The customer is always right but with the lean startup, tailoring your apps to your customers’ needs can be right for your business too.
