Building an MVP for your Startup — what I got wrong the first time
Creating a business plan and building an MVP is the place to start. Here's my approach to testing a new idea — and the pitfalls I wish someone had warned me about.
Do you have an entrepreneur within you and want to bring it to life? Creating a business plan and building an MVP (Minimal Viable Product) is the place to start. In this post, I will share my approach to testing out a new business idea and some of the pitfalls that you should avoid.
What is an MVP?
MVP stands for Minimal Viable Product — a product with enough features to attract your first customers and validate your idea. In some cases, this means just a clickable prototype. The main thing is that it's just enough to get validation from customers so that you know if it's worth spending more time and money on.
Every time we have a new idea for a new feature or product in my startup, my first question is: "What is the MVP we can do to test if this concept works?"
— Nanna Munkholm
MVP requirements
Before building your MVP, answer these questions:
- What problem do you want to solve?
- Who is your target audience?
- How can you reach them?
- What features do you need to solve their problem?
- What is the most important feature?
- How can I test that I'm solving their problem?
Be critical of the features — are they necessary for validation?
For my first tech startup, I first created a prototype to explain my idea to advisors and developers. My first error: I didn't test it on potential customers. My second mistake: I hadn't thought about how to track if early adopters liked the MVP. Don't repeat my mistakes.
How to build an MVP
Depending on the technology depth, you have three options:
1. A clickable MVP (no functionality)
Great if you have no technical experience and want to get something into customers' hands quickly. Figma is the go-to tool — intuitive, and you can use the same designs later if you move to a coded solution.
2. A No-Code MVP
Creating a No-Code MVP is underrated. My picks:
- Glide Apps — great for quick internal tools, uses Google Sheets as a database
- FlutterFlow — more advanced, builds real iOS/Android apps, exports to Flutter code
- Bubble.io — best for web applications with complex data structures
3. An advanced (coded) MVP
Only choose this if you need a cool algorithm that does something genuinely new. Even then — use No-Code for the UI and code only what you can't build otherwise.
My final advice
Always maintain a critical mindset. Continuously ask: "Is this truly essential to prove my idea?" The goal is not to build a perfect product from the start — it's to gather insights and feedback to iterate on.
Don't build a rocket if all you need is a skateboard to get from A to B.