Concept & MVP Testing Services
Find out if your product, feature or message idea is a good one — before you build it. Our nimble team can test your concept with your target audience. Whether it’s a solution sketch, a value prop statement, or a fully-designed prototype, we’ll conduct just enough research to give you the validation and feedback you need to move forward.
Concept Testing Examples
Thales — B2B Software Concept Testing
We led 4 rounds of moderated testing of software concepts for enterprise security professionals — a critical audience for this $18 billion multinational. After each round, we facilitated a 1-day analysis workshop with UX and product teams. Learn more: Helping Thales Test Enterprise Security Concepts with B2B Decision-Makers.
GEICO — Consumer App Concept Testing
A GEICO product team needed to decide whether to build a new mobile app feature. We led qualitative concept testing and delivered actionable findings related to concept value and design. Learn more: Concept Testing of a Weather Alerts Feature for GEICO’s Mobile App.
BI Inc. — B2B Software Concept Testing
After conducting a field study at government agencies that use BI’s case management software, we teamed up with product managers to prototype and test solution concepts addressing the problems we observed. Learn more: Discovery Research with Government Case Managers for BI Inc.
“Working with Marketade has been an amazing experience. I highly recommended them to anyone!”
Case Study:
Using MVP Testing for Product/Market Validation
Challenge
Users are notoriously bad at predicting future behavior. But when it comes to product/market validation, many research teams feel handcuffed by traditional methods — so they ask for predictions anyway.
Action
On a recent project for a large marketplace site, we led a 7-step MVP testing process — from writing a hypothesis to aligning on success.
Result
Qualitative and quantitative data gave the product team the validation it needed to move forward with its solution hypothesis — based on what users do, not what they say.
Our Typical Process for Concept Testing Projects
While we customize each project, many of our concept and MVP testing projects follow a variation of this 5-step approach.
Discovery
We get up to speed and align on your project goals, audiences, past research, and KPIs.
Report
We send you a report that captures all findings, solutions, and next steps. We also include all research recordings and other data.
Collaboration
Through a remote or on-site workshop, we facilitate collaborative analysis of the research and guide your team toward alignment on changes and next steps.
Recruit
We conduct a rigorous recruiting and screening process to find representative users — from mass-market consumers to enterprise VPs.
Research
We moderate 1:1 concept testing sessions — and sometimes supplement this with unmoderated large-scale research.
“I thought the interview set-up, organization, and deliverables were all fantastic!”
Why Use Concept Testing?
Toss bad ideas before they’re expensive.
Many companies spend millions of dollars building ideas that fail. By testing a minimum viable product (MVP), you’ll spot failures before you waste money on them.
Iterate quickly on promising ideas.
Even great ideas rarely succeed on their first try. We’ll help you reduce and speed up the cycles you go through to arrive at a viable product.
Test desirability before usability.
We love usability testing. But it’s the wrong tool for learning if you should build something in the first place. Save it for after you’ve validated the concept.
Stop asking, ‘Would you use this?’
It’s easy to bias your users, especially when you’re eager to validate your idea. Our approach uses the right questions to validate real-world demand.
Show execs evidence of bad ideas.
Ever have an executive who’s convinced their idea is a great one, no matter what you say? Get customer data showing how their vision matches reality.
“Fantastic. I loved the process to brainstorm at a very abstract level and then quickly distill that into real action items.”