Mak­ing sense of your pro­to­type test data

Ana­lyz­ing your pro­to­type test results is essen­tial for mak­ing informed deci­sions as you refine your solu­tion.

1. Orga­nize your inter­view data and spot pat­terns

Start by col­lect­ing all your notes, obser­va­tions, and record­ings in one place. Then group the data by test task or by dif­fer­ent parts of the pro­to­type. Iden­ti­fy pat­terns and trends by look­ing for recur­ring issues or com­ments – espe­cial­ly moments that stood out as par­tic­u­lar­ly smooth or frus­trat­ing.

2. Dig into the data

Pri­or­i­tize your find­ings by rat­ing how seri­ous each issue is. Pri­or­i­tize prob­lems that mul­ti­ple par­tic­i­pants expe­ri­enced. Quan­ti­fy your results by cal­cu­lat­ing suc­cess rates for spe­cif­ic tasks and mea­sur­ing time spent on dif­fer­ent inter­ac­tions.

For qual­i­ta­tive feed­back, take time to under­stand com­ments in con­text. High­light key phras­es, recur­ring themes, and any­thing that sig­nals deep­er user needs or chal­lenges.

3. Visu­al­ize what you’ve learned

Use charts or heat maps to high­light how par­tic­i­pants inter­act­ed with your pro­to­type. Cus­tomer jour­ney maps or user flow dia­grams are also help­ful – they show each step a par­tic­i­pant takes, from entry points to actions, deci­sions, and end goals. These visu­als make it eas­i­er to spot fric­tion points and areas for improve­ment.

4. Revis­it your assump­tions

Your test results may reveal that you mis­un­der­stood the core prob­lem, focused on the wrong part of the solu­tion, or select­ed the wrong test audi­ence. Don’t hes­i­tate to revise your assump­tions based on what you’ve learned – and if need­ed, run anoth­er round of test­ing. If the results shift how you think about your impact, update your impact mod­el and met­rics to reflect those new insights.

Devel­op­ing a busi­ness mod­el and con­nect­ing it to your impact strat­e­gy

A strong busi­ness mod­el is the foun­da­tion of of any suc­cess­ful impact start­up. One use­ful tool to help you map it out is the Lean Can­vas .

Here are a few steps to get you start­ed.

1. Clear­ly define the prob­lem

Iden­ti­fy the one to three most impor­tant group faces. Then describe how those prob­lems are cur­rent­ly being addressed – or not – by exist­ing solu­tions.

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2. Write a clear unique val­ue propo­si­tion (UVP)

Cre­ate a sim­ple, com­pelling core mes­sage that explains what makes your solu­tion unique – and worth choos­ing. This is your unique val­ue propo­si­tion (UVP). It should clear­ly express the val­ue your solu­tion deliv­ers to cus­tomers and answer the ques­tion: Why you? Focus on how your start­up meets cus­tomer needs bet­ter, faster, or more mean­ing­ful­ly than exist­ing alter­na­tives.

3. Define your cus­tomer seg­ments

Iden­ti­fy who your cus­tomers and ear­ly adopters are, and describe these groups in detail.

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4. Choose the right chan­nels

Decide how you’ll reach your cus­tomers. Are they eas­i­er to engage online or offline? Does it make more sense to con­nect with them direct­ly or through part­ners or plat­forms?

5. Describe your solu­tion clear­ly

Once you’ve fig­ured out how to reach your poten­tial cus­tomers, describe your solu­tion in a way that’s short, sharp, and easy to under­stand.

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6. Define your unfair advan­tage

An unfair advan­tage refers to aspects of your busi­ness mod­el that com­peti­tors can’t eas­i­ly copy or repli­cate. It’s about the unique fea­tures or resources that set your start­up apart and are hard to imi­tate. Think about what makes your solu­tion tru­ly dis­tinc­tive and dif­fi­cult to dupli­cate – like a patent, for exam­ple.

7. Map out and assess poten­tial rev­enue streams

Now it’s time to explore how your start­up could make mon­ey. Some com­mon rev­enue mod­els include:

• Direct sale of prod­ucts or ser­vices
• Sub­scrip­tions
• Freemi­um (a free ver­sion with paid upgrades)
• Licens­ing
• Con­sult­ing ser­vices
• Part­ner­ships and spon­sor­ing

Once you’ve list­ed the options, eval­u­ate each one based on:

• How well it sup­ports your impact goals
• Its long-term sus­tain­abil­i­ty
• Its poten­tial to scale with your start­up

8. Explore cre­ative busi­ness mod­els

Con­sid­er ways to use prof­itable parts of your busi­ness to sup­port areas that may gen­er­ate less rev­enue but deliv­er high impact. A few options:

• Hybrid mod­el: Mix dif­fer­ent rev­enue streams to spread risk.
• Impact-based pric­ing: Adjust your pric­ing based on the social or envi­ron­men­tal val­ue your solu­tion cre­ates..
• Cross-sub­si­diza­tion: Use prof­its from one part of your busi­ness to fund less prof­itable, high-impact activ­i­ties.

9. Exam­ine your costs

Map out the major costs tied to both your busi­ness mod­el and your impact mod­el. Use col­or-cod­ing or cat­e­gories to keep things clear – devel­op­ment, mar­ket­ing, team, etc. Be sure to include the cost of impact mea­sure­ment and report­ing.

10. Set your key met­rics

Define the most impor­tant (impact) met­rics that you’ll use to mea­sure suc­cess. Use what you’ve learned from test­ing to refine your approach, and make sure both your solu­tion and busi­ness mod­el are built on sol­id ground. Your impact mea­sure­ment should evolve as your start­up grows. Use insights from pro­to­type test­ing and mar­ket research to adjust them over time. This will increase your chances of achiev­ing long-term impact and suc­cess, even as your busi­ness mod­el evolves.

Next chap­ter: Devel­op your MVP

At this point, you’ve like­ly val­i­dat­ed your pro­to­type, demon­strat­ed the impact and mar­ket poten­tial of your solu­tion and your busi­ness mod­el and laid the ground­work for a sus­tain­able busi­ness mod­el. In oth­er words …

• You’ve suc­cess­ful­ly test­ed your pro­to­type and received pos­i­tive feed­back.
• You have ear­ly proof that your solu­tion cre­ates real out­comes for your tar­get group.
• There are clear signs that there is a mar­ket for your solu­tion and that it is scal­able.
• You’ve devel­oped a busi­ness mod­el that sup­ports both growth and impact

If all that sounds like you, you’re ready to move on to the next chap­ter and build the first basic ver­sion of your solu­tion, your MVP.

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Tips for suc­cess­ful­ly val­i­dat­ing your pro­to­type, impact poten­tial, mar­ket fit, and busi­ness mod­el