Most startups do not fail because the idea was bad. They fail because the idea never got tested. Founders spend months building products in isolation, convinced they know what the market wants — only to discover, after enormous investment, that they were solving the wrong problem or building for the wrong customer.
The antidote is the MVP: a Minimum Viable Product. Not a half-built version of your dream product, but a deliberate, stripped-back solution designed to answer one question as quickly and cheaply as possible: Does anyone actually want this?
This guide gives you a practical 10-day sprint to take your idea from concept to something real customers can interact with. No funding required. No large team needed. Just focused execution.
Before You Start: The One Question That Matters
Before day one, get clear on your core hypothesis. Not the vision — the hypothesis. Complete this sentence: 'I believe [target customer] will pay for [specific solution] because [specific problem they have].' Everything in the next 10 days is designed to test whether that sentence is true.
Days 1–2: Define the Problem, Not the Product
Your first two days belong to research, not building. Talk to at least five potential customers. Not to pitch your idea — to understand their problem. Ask them about their current workflow, what frustrates them most, what solutions they have already tried, and what they would pay to fix the issue.
Resist the urge to present your solution during these conversations. Listen. You are looking for patterns: recurring frustrations, language they use to describe the problem, the emotional weight they attach to it. The founders who skip this step almost always build the wrong thing.
Days 3–4: Define Your MVP Scope
Armed with real customer insight, define the absolute minimum feature set that would solve the core problem. Not the version you want to build eventually — the version that could work right now with minimal development.
A useful rule: if you are not embarrassed by your MVP, you have built too much. The goal is not to impress — it is to learn. Common MVP formats include:
- A landing page with a sign-up form that describes the product and collects emails from interested users.
- A manual-first service: you deliver the outcome by hand before automating anything.
- A simple prototype built with no-code tools like Webflow, Glide, or Bubble.
- A WhatsApp or Telegram bot that simulates the product experience.
- A single-feature web app that solves exactly one problem.
Days 5–7: Build
Three days of focused building. The technology choices matter less than the speed of execution. Use templates, no-code platforms, and existing infrastructure wherever possible. If your MVP requires more than three days to build, you have scoped it too broadly — strip it back further.
At Roar Media, we help Nigerian founders move through this phase rapidly by providing pre-built website templates, rapid web development, and no-code automation setup. The goal is a functional prototype by the end of day seven — not polished, but working.
Days 8–9: Get It in Front of Real People
The most common mistake founders make is spending day eight tweaking the product instead of showing it to users. Resist that impulse. Your MVP is supposed to feel rough. That is the point.
Reach out to the people you interviewed in days one and two. Share the prototype. Watch them use it — ideally in person or over a video call. Do not explain or defend. Observe. Where do they get confused? What excites them? What do they ignore? What questions do they ask that you did not anticipate?
Aim for ten user interactions across these two days. That is enough to identify the critical patterns that will shape your next iteration.
Day 10: Decide and Document
Your final day is for synthesis and decision-making. Review what you learned. Does the evidence support your original hypothesis, or does it suggest a pivot? Common outcomes include:
- Validated: Users understood the product, engaged with it, and expressed willingness to pay. Move to development with confidence.
- Pivoted: The core problem was right but your solution missed the mark. Redefine the MVP and run another sprint.
- Invalidated: The problem was not significant enough to drive action. This is valuable information — better to know now than after six months of development.
Document what you learned, what you decided, and why. This record becomes the foundation of your investor narrative, your product roadmap, and your team alignment as you scale.
The 10-Day Sprint Is Just the Beginning
The point of the sprint is not to launch a finished product. It is to replace assumption with evidence as quickly as possible. The founders who build great companies are not the ones with the best ideas — they are the ones who get to the truth fastest and adapt accordingly.
If you are at the idea stage and ready to move, Roar Media works with Nigerian founders at every stage of this process — from MVP development and rapid prototyping to full product builds once the concept is validated. Your 10 days start now.
