Does an MVP Release Make Sense for Your Mobile Initiative?

Over the last several years we talk less and less about building mobile proofs of concept (POCs) and more about producing “minimum viable product” (MVP).  

The two terms are not the same in that a POC is generally intended to address key risks—often technical—or to socialize a product concept internally.  While MVPs can do these things too, the big difference is that an MVP version is released to the market as working software.

However, some product owners have heartburn about the MVP concept.  The idea of releasing what they see as a half-baked effort is believed to be a significant market and brand perception risk.

In addition to assuaging risk-related concerns, defining MVP can be like the proverbial twelve blind men and the elephant—each stakeholder sees the product and its success from their own perspective.  Is it minimum testable, minimum usable, or even minimum “lovable” product?  Or should you wait to release an “exceptional viable product” that is impressive but doesn’t have everything included?  Isn’t MVP just for start-ups?

What is MVP?
What is an MVP-caliber product release?  To give context to the answer, consider the standard MVP definition for all products (software or not):

The minimum viable product is that version of a new product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort.

Generally, an MVP release has the four key characteristics:

1. Sharply pruned, minimum feature set for a new product that is required to test foundational product hypotheses—what we believe to be true about “early adopter” or target users’ needs and desires, likely behavior, and what is valuable.  What’s “minimally viable” is a subjective call and can be quite difficult to agree upon (see also my post on Capturing the Mobile Moment, a quick guide to targeting the right mobile features).
2. Intended and designed to test, measure and learn how to shape the next product release
3. Minimizes risk by conserving effort, time and financial investments
4. Released to the market and/or end users

For mobile applications there are a several additional considerations that will impact your definition of MVP:

• Target Device and OS.  Much effort, time and money can be saved by targeting a narrow range of devices and operating system versions.
• Connectivity.  Will your application work only when connected or must it also work offline?  Adding offline capabilities will probably add complexity, especially if there is any data synchronization required.
• Integration.  Getting to mobile readiness of corporate data is often the longest duration task for mobile products.  Data that’s readily available will probably influence the MVP feature set.
• Deployment.  It’s no secret that getting your application through app store approval is easier for Android apps—typically a couple days—than for iOS apps (maybe two weeks), which are also subject to a much higher level of design review.
• Management.  If you’re deploying an enterprise or B2B mobile app you may be required to secure, deploy and manage the app through an MDM product.
• Analytics.  Capturing basic user event data and app performance data is a must-have to support the test/measure/learn approach that makes an MVP effective (see also my post on Developing a Mobile Analytics Strategy)
• Privacy, Security, Compliance.  Inadvertently exposing customer or company data can be a disaster—don’t skip this vital step!  If you are collecting regulated customer data, make sure it is properly safeguarded.

Where MVP Fits in the Product Lifecycle

As we decide if MVP is right for your mobile initiative it’s important to briefly establish an MVP release’s place in the product development cycle.

Think of MVP as your product’s introduction to the market or end users.  It’s the first of many releases, each of which builds value based on lessons from prior releases.  Mobile apps in particular require many releases due to not only user feedback but technology changes, market changes, competitors, privacy or security concerns, and much more.

Have you ever looked at leading mobile apps’ release histories in the app stores?  They typically update several times a month for years.  MVP was a one-time event that introduced the product—and only the tip of the iceberg for the product roadmap.

Is MVP Right for Your Mobile Initiative?

Now that we have established what MVP is, identified special considerations for mobile apps, and properly placed it in the product lifecycle, is it right for your mobile initiative?  There are several factors that will indicate if an MVP-based approach to your mobile initiative will be effective and appropriate:

• Is this a new product?  If the answer is yes, then an MVP is absolutely on target.  In short, it is the best way to minimize risk, conserve budget and then apply time/money saved to lessons learned.  If your mobile initiative is not a new product but only an incremental release or minor update of an existing mobile product then an MVP may be unnecessary.

• Is mobile a new platform for an existing product?  If you are migrating an existing product from, say, the web to mobile you need to take an MVP approach.  While you may believe you understand what features and capabilities from the existing web product translate to mobile—and which uniquely mobile capabilities to add to the product—it’s well advised that you will still need an MVP to vet key assumptions.

• Do you have a product roadmap?  Product roadmaps are based on a collection of hypotheses about users’ needs and desires, likely behavior, what will be valuable, and so on.  For mobile apps—maybe more so than other channels because the technology and market landscape is incredibly fluid—the MVP approach is the best way to efficiently validate your hypotheses based on users’ real feedback.  However, if your mobile initiative is not tied to roadmap for delivering progressive value (are you missing an opportunity?) and the initiative is to achieve a highly tactical objective that won’t be measured or improved you may not need an MVP release.

• Are you targeting consumers or internal/B2B users?  If you’re targeting consumers MVP is a must.  Consumers—especially the mobile crowd—are simply too fickle and unpredictable to responsibly do otherwise.  If you’re targeting internal or B2B users with a new product or a product that will evolve over time starting with an MVP release is the best approach.  However, there may be specific circumstances, such as an upgrade of existing product or an extremely well-understood operational capability, where an MVP is unnecessary.  If your initiative seems to fit in the “specific circumstances” bucket, proceed with caution—mobile is full of surprises.

• Is user feedback a priority?  Ok—this is a little tongue-in-cheek.   Every product owner values user feedback.  And this is precisely why learning from an MVP release is the quickest and most time/financially efficient way to test product hypotheses—and then make quickly make changes that reflect what your users’ feedback and behavior (because you’re collecting analytics) are telling you about what they value.

Planning For and Learning from an MVP Release

Most mobile initiatives fit profiles that benefit from an MVP/Product Lifecycle approach (see also my post on Mobile Project vs. Mobile Product).  If your mobile initiative is in this group, here are a few planning activities (among many others) to cover before launch:

• Align with Business Objectives.  Which business objectives will the mobile app support?  (See also my post on Why Your Mobile Initiative Isn’t Getting Funded to ensure you’re on target in this critical area.)
• Identify Success Criteria and How to Measure.  How will you know that the app has achieved MVP success?  How will you objectively measure that?  Conversely, what results will indicate that the product concept either requires a significant pivot—or even a swift death?
• Identify User Stories and Perform Backlog Grooming.  Again, the wisdom and art is in what you exclude rather than what you include.  Prune to the minimum set of user stories that will enable you to effectively evaluate product hypotheses for target user personas.
• Plan to Collect and Analyze Data.  Be sure that the data to support your success criteria is collected and available for analysis to prove product hypotheses.
• Establish a Timeline.  How long will the MVP release be in production before you prioritize your lessons learned and focus on the next release?  Hint:  You will need a high-level of velocity here in order to not lose mobile users—patience is not their strong suit.

Now that your MVP release has launched, you will want to have a laser-focus on quickly learning what to change for your next release.  Several key sources of information include:

• User Analytics Data.  Did users do what you expected or planned for them?  Is their behavior aligned with business objectives or do you need to rethink?
• Application Performance Data.  Did application performance impact user tasks or retention?
• App store reviews (if public) or user interviews (private).  What do users love (or hate)?
• Target KPIs.  Impacted as planned?

Finally, know that mobile has a unique set of concerns; some level of mobile governance will help your new product meet objectives over time.

Closing Thought

Defining MVP release scope and functionality—as well as clearly identifying what hypotheses will be tested—is an important part of a winning product introduction.

Frictionless Mobile Experiences—and Why They Matter to You

We’ve all now heard how important a great mobile user experience is to customers.  But what is a “frictionless” mobile experience?

In the mobile context, “frictionless” means to simplify key elements of the user experience to the point where they’re almost unnoticed, taken for granted—and therefore truly delightful, and ultimately more useful.

Popular Examples
Let’s look at a few well-known examples:

Uber

Using location-tracking technology Uber knows where you are (you don’t have to supply an address) and the driver closest to you.  This makes getting a cab quickly one button press away—it couldn’t be any simpler.

Then, when your ride is complete, you just walk away.  No fishing for payment or tip, no receipt—no waiting while the cabbie fumbles for their manual credit card imprinter.  Secure.  Awesome!

Amazon

Amazon launched one-click buying in 2000.  Complex on the backend, but a simple-as-possible customer experience.

Now, with Amazon Dash, Amazon has made buying replenishable items even easier.  You’re out of laundry detergent?  Click a button mounted by your washer and another container of laundry detergent is shortly at your doorstep.  The cost of the Amazon Dash Button is rebated on your first purchase and shipping (with Prime) is free.  With apologies to Office Depot, this is the “Easy Button”!

Square

Square has something for both retailers and customers.  First, for retailers, Square is a small device that turns any connected smartphone or tablet into a point of sale terminal.  And transaction fees are lower than most competitors.

For customers and retailers alike, Square delights by associating your credit card with your account.  As a result, the retailer now has no need to print a receipt as your receipt will go directly to your email address—and you don’t have to carry a receipt or enter your email address (after the first time).  A very simple transaction for both parties.

Now let’s look at how to create a frictionless experience from another angle:  the learning pattern the experience requires.  Typical mobile experiences tend to be cognitive; that is, the learning pattern requires the user to read basic instructions in order to learn how to use an app.  Frictionless app experiences, however, tend to be perceptional where the learning pattern provides the user just enough information to allow an empathetic engagement where the user can “feel” their way through the experience.  No instructions required.

Here are several more examples from a learning pattern perspective:

Domino’s Pizza iPad App

By using a known, almost pre-prescribed perceptual learning pattern, customers engage and “play” with building the order they want.  Little or no cognitive learning is needed and the experience is almost entirely perceptual.  Customers are engaging in the experience without really knowing it.  The “why” can be understood by Domino’s mission statement: “Sell more pizza, make more fun."  The experience was so well received it got Domino’s a webby. 

Motion Savvy App

Natural user interfaces (NUI) are redefining what “frictionless” experiences can be.  Not only can they provide intuitive engagement patterns that are built on a perceptual learning model, they can take very complex cognitive learning patterns and translate them. The Motionsavvy mobile app uses a NUI to provide a masterful engagement model that will only become more mainstream as a learnable model.  Voice, eye tracking, gesture tracking and location will be the new input devices for these emerging models.  The “Why” is rooted in the source of all of user experience… the right accessibility offered in the best mental model.  Leap, Kinect for Windows, and Myo are all emerging and will redefine how we engage with our devices.

Shyp App

Using a very simple experience the customer becomes part of the process verses just engaging with an app. Simple, direct, and a clever model that plays on the embedded expectations that customers already have with regard to buying and selling on the web.

So, why does all this matter to you?  Because without a conscious focus on creating a frictionless experience pitfalls await.  A few examples:

• It is all too easy to simply duplicate an experience designed for the web
• Mobile’s unique hardware capabilities are not well used (e.g., GPS/location services)
• The mobile ecosystem is not effectively leveraged and you lose opportunities to add value

In short, you risk losing mobile users and that means losing significant business to competitors who are thinking how to create a frictionless experience.

How to Eliminate Friction
So, how can you make your mobile users’ experience frictionless?  Here are a few suggestions to get started:

• Simplify registration and authentication.  Use Facebook, Google+ or another service—don’t make users create yet another user account with IDs and passwords they won’t remember.  Use biometric authentication—no one forgets their thumb.  And don’t make a user log in unless they have logged out on purpose (secure apps like financials, healthcare, excepted).
• Respect users’ time (and lack of patience).  Can data be loaded in the background?  Can important information be shown on one screen instead of two?  Can a transaction be completed with one tap instead of two?  Or better, can you do something valuable for the user without their explicit input (e.g., use location services to fix their location, determine time to get to an appointment, etc.)?
• Use appropriate learning patterns.  “Intuitive” is overused when describing mobile user experiences.  But what we’re aiming for is an experience that flows (e.g., is perceptional), needs almost no explanations, clearly identifies objectives and makes it easy to perceive how to reach them.
• Remember.  Remember me and my data so that I don’t have to re-type anything.  If I have to input data, make it easy—for example, accept voice input or a text message (see what /Slash has done to make things easier).
• Leverage context.  Is the user at home, in a store, at an event or favorite haunt?  If they’re in a store, push information they want like offers or coupons.  If they’re at an event, inform them when friends are nearby.  Anticipate needs and desires.
• Technical ecosystem.  To make things even more seamless, make sure you take advantage of the users’ technology ecosystem.  For example, a user may have a smartwatch, TV device, tablet, etc.  How can those devices—all with their unique usage contexts—become part of a complete and satisfying experience?
• Experience ecosystem.  What partnerships with other apps might support your offering of a complete experience?  For example, Spotify partnered with Nike+ and RunKeeper to deliver music while users are exercising.  Sonos, who makes wireless audio systems, partnered with Pandora and Spotify to enable Sonos users to play their music libraries from directly inside the Sonos app.  Less friction, more satisfaction.

And, last of all, pay attention to the user experience through analytics and automated reporting of application issues—there’s always room for improvement.

Closing Thought
Create the frictionless mobile experiences users crave and meet your business objectives successfully.  Do something amazing!

Eight Reasons Why You Need Mobile Governance

Starting your enterprise mobile journey often appears deceptively easy.  

Someone identifies a business need for mobility, responds to a stakeholder’s interest or competition demands a mobile capability and then you either build or buy a solution.

What's the Worst that Could Happen?
However, companies quickly find that this ad hoc, tactical approach to enterprise mobility leads to a number of unfortunate results.  A few typical examples we see:

• The “brand injury” – User experience and brand representation is poor and creates any variety of off-message perceptions by employees, customers and/or partners.
• The “one-hit wonder” – No plan for product enhancement, not built for support and maintenance, architecture creates many risks such as privacy breeches, compliance problems, performance issues, etc.  See also “brand injury.”
• The “money pit” – Development approach is unsuited for meeting business objectives and much re-work, delays and technical debt result.  Or pursuing this project eats up budget for another more strategic project.  Executives regret they ever approved the work and mobile as a whole loses momentum.
• The “over-promise” – Inexperienced product teams are unable to meet business objectives due to technical challenges/delays, lack of stakeholder involvement, unrealistic expectations for success (or no defined success criteria), lack of user insight or inability to pivot based on actual results.
• The “stinker” – Skunk works project distracts key resources from valuable work, duplicates another initiative or is not aligned with the business, no effective leverage of best practices, infrastructure, existing code or business logic.  Who approved this?!  See also “one-hit wonder.”
• The “duplicate” – Someone decides that what’s needed is a mobile app that duplicates all the functionality of an existing web app or fat client app.  The app doesn’t address users’ “mobile moments” and is quickly on its way to life as shelf ware.  See also “brand injury” and “money pit.”

To avoid these common pitfalls, companies should make the investment not just in mobile development, but also in mobile governance.  

What exactly is mobile governance?  While mobile development is the execution of a specific release of a mobile product roadmap, mobile governance focuses on how to most effectively execute on all aspects of an organization’s mobile strategy, including management, measurement, best practices and standards—all with the objective of being best in class and achieving competitive advantage.

To better illustrate what mobile governance is and how it can help you be more effective, here are eight reasons why you need mobile governance:

Strategic Alignment and Focus

Making the right investments in mobile requires involving stakeholders from across the business, as well as key partners and customers.  This diverse group is best positioned to identify, organize, prioritize and fund mobile opportunities for the company as a whole and ensure alignment with overall business objectives and digital strategy.

To facilitate stakeholders’ priorities, the mobile governance team must socialize and manage mobile initiatives as a cohesive program made up of a number of product development efforts which will yield clear benefits.

Plan to periodically review prioritization—the competitive landscape and technology opportunities are highly fluid.

Business and Technical Oversight

Business oversight through the mobile governance team can prevent many of the negative scenarios described above.  Focus areas for business oversight include:

• Product portfolio management and product roadmap direction
• Legal and compliance
• Marketing and brand alignment
• Operational alignment, integration and readiness, including acceptance testing, pilot programs

Like business oversight, technical oversight has a major role to play in prevention of negative scenario development by providing clear guidance and support in the following areas:

• Support for and best use of enterprise mobile infrastructure
• Best practices for architecture and development, security
• User-centered design, adherence to platform standards
• Technical standards and approaches, preferred tools
• Quality management and testing methodologies, tools

Expectation Management

Like all nascent technologies, mobile is full of hype.  And, according to Forrester Research, even the most successful mobile applications take at least three major release cycles to find the right balance and meet business objectives; many must make a significant pivot after the first and/or second release.  Consequently, one of the most important functions of the mobile governance team is to set and manage expectations, including:

• Return on investment (ROI)—and when to typically expect it
• Total cost of ownership (TCO) for a product with many releases vs. a project
• Challenges and barriers to success.  Common example:  Immature or non-existent mobile infrastructure is a serious barrier to the best laid product plans and may require significant remediation and investment to enable the business to meet objectives for mobile initiatives
• Need for innovation and velocity.  Many sponsors expect they’ll just need one release this year—it’s the mobile governance team that needs to set enterprise expectations for competitive innovation and the development velocity to support it
• User expectations.  Much has been made of the “consumerization” of IT—and this applies particularly to mobile.  Product owners need direction on how to build the right experiences for different user groups.

Momentum

When it comes to building mobile capabilities for the enterprise and integrating mobile into overall digital strategy, companies often struggle to make progress—especially if they experience one or more the unfortunate scenarios described earlier.  

The mobile governance team must be well-positioned to drive enterprise visibility to and awareness of mobile initiatives.  By reaching the organization as a whole the mobile governance team can help drive collaboration among the many constituents required to design, build and maintain a successful mobile program.

Measurement and Reporting

The high percentage of mobile initiatives that have no or ill-defined success criteria would likely surprise you.  Or success criteria is defined but there’s no way to actually collect the supporting data.  At a higher level, mobile programs also need established measures of success and periodic reporting of results.

The mobile governance team must drive common measures of success for individual products.  Clear, regular and relevant communication of results by product teams will strengthen program momentum.  In addition, the mobile governance team should establish and report measurement of the mobile program as a whole.  

Finally, mobile governance should set standards for the use of mobile analytics and integration of mobile data into enterprise business intelligence to catalyze cross-channel insights.

Brand Protection

Design, quality and innovation signal brand vitality to employees, partners and customers.  One of the mobile governance team’s core tasks is to closely align with marketing to ensure:

• Product fit in overall brand strategy
• Brand guidelines are appropriately implemented
• User experience supports and enhances brand personality

Moreover, the mobile governance team must be a beacon that guides product teams in designing products that support brand cohesion.

Leverage and Scalability

Product teams tend to work in silos, especially if they are in separate business units or functional organizations.  This organizational fragmentation is difficult to oversee and often leads to inconsistent implementation of standards even when they exist.

One of the most important roles the mobile governance team can play is to enable organizational and technology leverage and scalability.  For example, coach product teams on best use of:

• Existing infrastructure services
• Common, reusable components and code
• Abstraction and configuration over custom or single-use code
• Skilled resources across products
• Agile methodology to achieve velocity

Equally valuable, the mobile governance team should foster cross-team sharing of experiences, lessons learned and how they implemented enterprise best practices.

Supportability

With product teams rightly focused on velocity, without oversight supportability is a frequent casualty.  And, as a result, products go into production that the organization is ill-equipped or prepared to support.

Consequently, the mobile governance team must establish application architecture standards for supportability, a clear process for support transition for various release types (major, minor, break/fix), and guidance for prioritization of common issues (new OS version support, device support, etc.).

In addition, the mobile governance team should set the enterprise standard for support tools such as EMM (enterprise mobile management, formerly mobile device management (MDM), MAM, and so on, to ensure operational support is effectively using tool capabilities to support the business.

Closing Thoughts

Clearly there are many persuasive reasons for organizations to consider implementing mobile governance.  However, mobile governance doesn’t have to start with a full Mobile Center of Excellence to be effective.  Start with a mobile "community of practice", grow toward a steering committee approach, and then, when your mobile product portfolio can support it, create a center of excellence.