A quick session to learn about fast prototyping and user testing. If you are using a collaborative online whiteboard like Miro or Mural, great. If not, don't worry, you'll still be able to follow this without prior knowledge.

Agree on what you are building

If you already have a product or prototype you can skip this step. This quick exercise will help you align on what you are building as a team and prepare you for some user testing even if you don't have anything tangible.

  1. Select someone who can take on a role as the decision maker. He/she needs to be comfortable with taking risks and making mistakes. They will not steer the conversation or make heavy decision but needs to come in when the group can't reach consensus.
  2. Set a timer on 10 minutes. Together but individually, write as many problems your product is supposed to solve as possible.
  3. Take 5 minutes and with 3 votes each (4 for the decider), vote on the most important solutions. Don't discuss.

This quick exercise should show you what everyone in the team is thinking and highlight the most important solutions/expressions of the solutions. Alternatively, and if you have time, you can also run the Lean Canvas exercise:

https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/secure.notion-static.com/9466a04b-54ab-4976-ac03-61468e1fa0c4/Screenshot_2020-07-15_at_11.28.47.png

Prepare a prototype for the main target segment

(Even for a multi-persona marketplace)

The prototype is just a tangible representation of your idea. It's not the full execution, but good enough to show value without having to explain it. Sometimes it's hard to get the resources to design a prototype that will work.

Even better is if you already have something people can look at. Ideally something like a prototype, which can be easily fixed or changed along with the feedback you are receiving. Here are a few important points:

Only make it as complex as it needs to be. Figure out what your unique value proposition is and design a prototype with the least effort possible. Coding stuff can make it look cool and smooth and show how complex it could be, but mocking up a few screens in Figma might have the same result for a test and take much less time.

People don't like to think. Make it as realistic as possible so people don't need to imagine how it could be, but rather see it for what it already is.

Most of the time it's easiest to design an interface in order to show what it could become. Figma is a great tool, but again, it depends on what you are designing. Unity is great for prototyping many tools too. If you're working on something haptic an Arduino will do for the first version.