Dogfooding 101

So you want to be your first user?

The "we are the first user" approach to building a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) or Beta release for a software startup implies that the development team or company uses their product themselves before launching it to other users. This is also known as "dogfooding," a term that comes from the phrase "eating your own dog food," meaning using your own products or services.

Here are some pros and cons of this approach:

Pros:

1. In-depth Understanding: By being the first users of your product, you can gain a deep understanding of the user experience, which can inform future development and improvements.

2. Immediate Feedback: You'll get instant feedback about your product. Any bugs, user interface issues, or other problems will likely be identified quickly.

3. Credibility: If you use your product and can demonstrate its value firsthand, it can increase your credibility with potential customers.

4. Improvement of Features: As you are the first users, you can identify which features are most useful and which ones need improvement or removal.

5. Cost-Effective: It's a cost-effective way of testing. Instead of hiring a dedicated team of testers or releasing it to users who might encounter issues, your team can troubleshoot problems first.

Cons:

1. Bias: There's a risk of bias because you are both the creator and the user. This may lead to blindness towards certain issues that an outsider might easily spot.

2. Limited Perspective: Your team's use cases may not represent those of your broader target audience. This could lead you to overemphasize features that aren't as important to your actual users.

3. Scalability Issues: Your team might not be large enough to accurately test the scalability of the product or how it behaves under high load.

4. Time-Consuming: It can be time-consuming for your team to use and test the product while also trying to develop it further.

5. Over-Refinement: There's a risk that you might end up refining the product too much based on your own preferences, which might not align with your target users.

To mitigate these risks, it's crucial to involve users from your target audience as early as possible in the testing process, in addition to using the product yourself. This will help ensure your product meets your customer's needs and not just your own.

The most important part is that you regularly reflect and iterate on your product. AKA, you need to have a regular retrospective to intentionally improve your product. Conduct customer discovery, and use these conversations to help shape your product for the marketplace.

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