Growth & Strategy
Personas
SaaS & Startup
Time to ROI
Short-term (< 3 months)
Last year, I had a potential client approach me with what seemed like a dream project: build a comprehensive two-sided marketplace platform with a substantial budget. The technical challenge was exciting, and it would have been one of my biggest projects to date.
I said no.
Here's the thing — they came to me excited about AI tools like Lovable and no-code platforms, believing they could build anything quickly and cheaply. They weren't wrong about the technology. But their core statement revealed the real problem: "We want to see if our idea is worth pursuing."
They had zero existing audience, no validated customer base, no proof of demand. Just enthusiasm and a budget.
That conversation taught me everything about what makes an MVP truly lovable. It's not about building the most features or using the coolest tech. It's about understanding that your first MVP shouldn't be a product at all — it should be your marketing and sales process.
In this playbook, you'll discover:
Why the most lovable MVPs start with simple automation instead of complex platforms
The real examples of MVPs that built million-dollar businesses without writing a single line of code
My framework for testing demand before you build anything
How to identify when your "MVP" is actually just an expensive assumption
The counterintuitive approach that saves months of development time
Industry Reality
What every startup founder thinks they need to build
When founders think "MVP," they immediately jump to product features. The startup world has created this mythology around the "minimum viable product" that focuses entirely on the wrong things.
Here's what the industry typically recommends:
Start with a simple version of your core product
Build just enough features to test your hypothesis
Launch quickly and iterate based on user feedback
Use no-code tools to speed up development
Focus on user experience and core functionality
This advice exists because investors and accelerators want to see "product-market fit" — which sounds logical. The problem? This approach assumes your biggest risk is building the wrong features.
But for most startups, especially in 2025, the biggest risk isn't building the wrong product. It's having no idea who wants to buy it or how to reach them. Your beautiful MVP can have perfect user experience, but if you can't get users to even try it, you've just built an expensive science project.
The conventional wisdom misses the fundamental question: How do you know if anyone actually wants what you're building? Most founders answer this with surveys, interviews, or beta testing. But these methods tell you what people say they want, not what they'll actually pay for.
That's where the real lovable MVP strategy comes in — one that tests demand and distribution before you write a single line of code.
Consider me as your business complice.
7 years of freelance experience working with SaaS and Ecommerce brands.
When this potential client approached me about their marketplace platform, I recognized a pattern I'd seen before. They were excited about the technology but had no clear path to customers.
Their situation was textbook startup optimism: They believed if they built something good enough, users would find it. They had detailed wireframes, user personas, and even market research. What they didn't have was a single person who had expressed interest in paying for their solution.
I've worked with enough startups to know this story doesn't end well. You spend months building, launch to crickets, then scramble to figure out marketing and sales. By then, you're out of runway and energy.
Instead of taking their project, I challenged them with a simple question: "If you're truly testing market demand, why does your MVP need to take three months to build?"
This led to a deeper conversation about what they were actually trying to prove. They wanted to know if businesses would pay for their marketplace concept. But building the full platform wouldn't answer that question — it would just create something expensive to maintain while they figured out distribution.
What struck me about their approach was how common it is. Founders get excited about AI tools and no-code platforms because they make building feel easier. But easier building doesn't solve the real problem: validating that anyone wants what you're building before you build it.
This experience reinforced something I'd learned from my own client work: the most successful "MVPs" I've seen weren't products at all. They were smart ways of testing demand manually before automating anything.
Here's my playbook
What I ended up doing and the results.
After declining their project, I walked them through what I call the "Pre-Product MVP" framework — a system for validating demand before you build anything.
Day 1: Create Your Landing Page MVP
Instead of building a platform, I suggested they create a simple landing page or Notion document explaining their value proposition. This isn't about collecting emails — it's about forcing yourself to articulate exactly what problem you're solving and for whom.
Week 1: Start Manual Outreach
Rather than building user onboarding flows, I recommended they manually reach out to potential users on both sides of their marketplace. The goal: find 10 businesses that would commit to using the service if it existed.
Week 2-4: Become the Marketplace
Here's where it gets interesting. Instead of building software to connect buyers and sellers, they would manually match supply and demand via email and WhatsApp. This approach proves demand exists and shows you exactly what features matter most.
Month 2: Automate Only What You've Proven
Only after proving people will pay for manual matching should you consider building automation. By this point, you know exactly what to build because you've been doing it manually.
This framework works because it separates two distinct challenges: proving demand and building technology. Most startups try to solve both simultaneously, which is expensive and risky.
The beautiful thing about this approach is that it works across industries. Whether you're building B2B software, e-commerce tools, or marketplace platforms, you can test demand manually before writing code. Your "MVP" becomes your sales and marketing process, not your product.
I've seen this work with everything from SaaS products to e-commerce platforms. The companies that succeed are the ones that fall in love with the problem and the customer relationship, not the technology.
Manual First
Test every assumption by doing it manually before building automation — this reveals what actually matters to users.
Sales = MVP
Your sales process IS your MVP. If you can't sell it manually, software won't fix that fundamental problem.
Demand Validation
Prove people will pay before you build. Manual processes show real demand better than any survey or interview.
Distribution Reality
Building is the easy part. Knowing how to reach customers and convince them to try your solution is the real challenge.
The approach I recommended to this client would have saved them months of development time and thousands in unnecessary features. Here's what a proper validation process delivers:
Immediate Market Feedback: Within two weeks, they would know if businesses actually wanted their marketplace solution. No six-month development cycle required.
Clear Feature Prioritization: By manually facilitating transactions, they'd discover which features were essential versus nice-to-have. Most MVP features turn out to be completely unnecessary.
Real Revenue Validation: Manual processes can generate revenue from day one. If you can't charge for manual service, you probably can't charge for automated service either.
Distribution Discovery: The manual approach forces you to figure out how to reach customers — the skill that determines whether your startup succeeds or fails.
Most importantly, this approach builds confidence in the right things. Instead of feeling good about your technology stack, you feel confident about your market understanding and customer relationships.
What I've learned and the mistakes I've made.
Sharing so you don't make them.
This experience taught me five crucial lessons about what makes MVPs actually lovable:
1. Lovable MVPs solve real problems people are actively experiencing. If you can't find people willing to pay for a manual solution, automation won't change that.
2. The constraint isn't building — it's knowing what to build. In 2025, AI and no-code tools make building easier than ever. The hard part is market validation and customer discovery.
3. Your first "product" should be your sales process. Master the manual approach first, then systematize what works.
4. Distribution beats features every time. A basic solution that reaches the right people outperforms a sophisticated solution nobody finds.
5. Manual processes reveal true customer needs. Users tell you what they think they want in interviews. Manual processes show you what they actually need.
6. Speed to market means speed to learning, not speed to building. Getting market feedback in two weeks beats launching a product in three months.
7. Most MVP features are solutions to problems that don't exist. Start with human processes, then automate only what proves essential.
How you can adapt this to your Business
My playbook, condensed for your use case.
For your SaaS / Startup
For SaaS startups building lovable MVPs:
Start with manual customer success processes before building automated onboarding
Use spreadsheets and email before building dashboards and APIs
Prove customers will pay for manual service before automating anything
For your Ecommerce store
For ecommerce businesses creating lovable MVPs:
Test product demand with pre-orders before building inventory systems
Start with manual fulfillment to understand operational needs
Use social media and direct sales before building sophisticated e-commerce platforms