{"id":7906,"date":"2020-03-15T11:42:00","date_gmt":"2020-03-15T15:42:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=7906"},"modified":"2022-04-01T15:06:34","modified_gmt":"2022-04-01T19:06:34","slug":"wizard-of-oz-mvp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wizard-of-oz-mvp\/","title":{"rendered":"Wizard of Oz MVP – What Is It? Examples and Tips"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What is a Wizard of Oz MVP from Lean Startup? How do you build one? What does it teach you about your business? Learn the key strategies from Lean Startup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Wizard of Oz MVP Introduction<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Many startup ideas revolve around fancy automated services, especially those involving machine learning\/artificial intelligence. Let\u2019s use an example of an AI gift recommender. You, the customer, write a few sentences about what the gift recipient\u2019s personality and interests are. The product returns 3 Amazon links with products the recipient is likely to enjoy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a pretty complicated product to build. Once again, for your wizard of oz MVP, you don\u2019t want to waste time building the algorithms before figuring out if anyone even wants your service<\/strong>. It might turn out that this concept just doesn\u2019t resonate with people, or that your recommendation strategy is poor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So how do you test this concept? Once again, like the concierge MVP<\/a>, you can replace the service with a human. In a Wizard of Oz MVP, the user thinks she\u2019s interacting with an automated product, but in reality behind the curtain a human is pulling the levers.<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the case of the AI gift recommender, a user would submit a few sentences on a web form. Behind the curtain, a human looks at the submission, curates a list of suggestions, and emails them to the user, pretending to be an automated service. Just like in the Wizard of Oz!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The wizard of oz MVP gives the user a faithful representation of what the fully fledged product would act like, and you can gauge their reaction. You save a ton of product development time by using the very adaptable human.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The wizard of oz MVP strategy works because, frankly, the user doesn\u2019t care whether the backend is powered by an algorithm or a human<\/strong>. She just cares that her problem is being solved \u2013 in this case, that the gift recommendations are good and your friend\u2019s going to be happy. If customers love when a humans solve their problems, they\u2019ll likely love when a machine solves them the same way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With all of these MVPs, you should be at least somewhat <\/em>confident that you can build what\u2019s being promised. If you boast about a breathing device that lets you stay underwater for 30 minutes without scuba gear, you might get a lot of signups. But if you can\u2019t deliver, your company is hosed in the long term<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What is a Wizard of Oz MVP from Lean Startup? How do you build one? What does it teach you about your business? Learn the key strategies from Lean Startup.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7918,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[45,79],"tags":[78],"class_list":["post-7906","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-entrepreneurship","tag-lean-startup","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"\nWizard of Oz MVP - What Is It? Examples and Tips - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"What is a Wizard of Oz MVP? How do you build the right one for your startup? 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