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MenuWhen is it better to find a technical co-founder before developing an MVP vs. hiring a freelancer to build it for you, and vice-versa?
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A co-founder is a long-term relationships that should be built on trust, and passion, and time... time to fight, time to recover, time to build rapport. Ultimately, your co-founder shouldn't be based on *any* specific idea, because the two (or three?) of you could work on anything you are all passionate about, and either experience wild success or learn some great lessons along the way.
An MVP doesn't require a co-founder get built. In fact, the less technical code required the better. You should be able to validate most ideas with some very basic tools: WordPress site, Email list, a set of google forms, and a little love.
I think the most important question to ask yourself is, "Am I willing to have my idea change for the right person? Or am I just trying to find the best person to execute on my idea?"
For what it's worth, I've seen much more success with the former than the latter.
I push back on the premise of the question.
Before you look to find a co-founder or spend a cent on building something, make sure you've thought your idea through. Who are you for? What's the problem you solve? Are you clear on the insight you are working against and the positioning you will use when you bring the product to market? Many of the problems I end up working with founding teams on down the road can actually be traced to them having started out building something and then trying to figure out how to sell it, rather than starting with the need and a clear view of their prospective customer.
Spend your time and money there, first.
Co-founders are permanent, long-term members of your team and a technical co-founder is someone who has a long view of the product's development, is committed to seeing it happen, and can make it happen. If you don't need that, sub out.
Agree with the answers above. By definition, you don't need a technical co-founder before you create your MVP. Sometimes an MVP can be a free landing page or Wordpress or Mailchimp list, Eventbrite or some combination. Once you have traction and customers and a functioning MVP, any good technical co-founder will be more interested in taking a look and having a conversation with you.
Related Questions
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Are you at risk of your competitors copying your features by building MVPs?
Yep. Although I don't think that's limited to MVPs. It's just always the case. You can copy code, features, etc. but you can't copy soul. There will always be people who copy you. It's better to keep moving forward and accept the copy cats than it would be to try and shield yourself. Keep an eye on the copy cats. But in the long run, if you're authentic and worthy, you will beat them.JR
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What's the best way to build a MVP web app that handles order management, purchasing, invoicing, supplier management and inventory?
The best way to build an MVP for any SaaS product is to create a landing page that looks like a real product. Here's an example of one I built. http://www.happiily.com In this case, it advertises the primary features of the product and invites people to sign-up. When they do, they are asked for information which qualifies the person and then sends me an email. I built this quickly and very inexpensively and started getting inbound leads from it shortly thereafter. I got on the phone with each person who signed-up and explained the features I wanted to build and was able to do a lot of customer learning based on that. Happy to talk to you in a call if you'd like to talk more about customer development with SaaS products.TW
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What is the best strategy to take to establish proof of concept for a online platform concept prior to a beta version being created?
Likely you won't like my thoughts about this. When I give talks about business bootstrapping, I suggest people only work ideas which meet my "Sunset Rule". Sunset Rule - You should be able to go from idea to first sale, before sunset, or best consider other ideas. This also relates to your MVP. If you can't dream up an MVP + sell it before the sun goes down, best consider other ideas. Years ago, I was at an Internet Marketing Party mixer in Austin, TX + sat to visit with a friend. She was down because she was starting a new business + had spent months working on a business plan + determined she required $80K to bootstrap her business + then had spent another several months looking for investors. A buddy of mine + I sat with her for 15mins + slightly retooled her idea. She launched the next day for a one time investment of $144/year (cost of a Meetup.com account) + was generating some significant profit in a few days. Chunk down your MVP, so you can manually make sales by the end of the day... for $0 investment + you'll know for sure you have a profitable business. If you can't sell one unit, by the end of the day... best consider some other idea...DF
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How do you build a MVP for an innovative tech b2b product? We would need good amount of funding to build a decent MVP and show businesses.
The idea of an MVP is 'minimum, viable' ... If you feel you need a "good amount" of funding, I would challenge if you are minimum enough. Obviously, without knowing the details of your product, your ideal customer, or what need you will solve, it is hard to help expose what is necessary in an MVP and what is a Phase II or Phase III feature. I am happy to help you work through this, or answer specific questions, to get you rolling. Just book a call with some times that will work for you. Regardless, I would love to know more about it and how it goes after launch. To your success, -ShaunSN
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How to launch an MVP for an on-demand delivery startup?
There isn't a lot of published information that I've seen (or can quickly find) on how washio and postmates validated their business model, but I definitely agree that starting fairly lean and validating your business first even if that means a lot of manual effort up front is a better approach than investing heavily in infrastructure before launch. Of course, if you are very successful, that manual work will pile up quickly and managing it could be quite painful, but you can have worse problems than a successful launch. Maff Rigby's 7-day startup recommendation is definitely a good one.GW
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