Lean Project Discovery Phase: Definition, Process, Benefits

Any startup is well aware of the risk of failure. The risk increases as the pace of business and competition gets faster. As high as 97% these days. We’ve discussed Common Mistakes of MVP App Development before. But… Is there one thing that can significantly reduce the risk? To prevent 80% of things from going wrong? Something quite specific and tangible your vendor can do to guard against failure? Yes! The answer is in the Lean Discovery Phase.

Definition of the Discovery Phase

The Discovery Phase is often the first or initial stage of digital product development. You can think of it as a scoping phase when all stakeholders agree on a shared vision for the product. It involves defining:

• what the digital product is,
• what it does,
• who its target user is, and
• why the product is important.
• It also includes reaching an idea of what a good product will look like.

So basically, the Discovery Phase is a planning phase grounded in background research and analysis (market, competitors, and target users).

The process can look different for big and small companies, for a business versus a government enterprise. In some cases, you’ll have to spend months in this stage. You’ll need to describe all of the above in great detail.

For others, this phase might last a week or two and result in high-level (without much detail) points. This is why it is vital to distinguish what is a Lean Project Discovery Phase.

Lean Discovery Phase: Definition

Lean methodology focuses on making just enough effort and emphasizes continuous learning.

After all, online markets are much faster evolving than offline. For instance, Forbes statistics show that this 2024 year retail e-commerce sales will reach $6.913 trillion. That means growth of 9.6% compared to 2023 and 32.7% compared to 2021.

Social media commerce grows along. Analysts expect it to reach $1.698 billion. It indicates a growth of 30.8% compared to 2023 and a 71% increase compared to 2022.

These numbers should give a sense of how dynamic the market is. And the behavior of consumers in it is the same. They are transforming just as fast.

This is why the lean methodology makes the most sense today: research today’s market, and project for months up to a couple of years in the future. And start testing product ideas against the market and target users. It is often not reasonable to make 5-year projections and plan development in detail for a year. The agility of it is a competitive advantage for your business.

The Value Of The Lean Methodology and Its Discovery Phase

Therefore, the level of detail in this scoping phase is the lowest among other methodologies.

• During the Lean Discovery Phase, the first thing is to agree on the type of the minimal product — MVP, MLP, or MMP.
• The artifacts resulting from the lean discovery phase are more like drafts that will be clarified and explored through iterations of the minimal product.
• The beauty of the lean methodology is in its ultimate agility. Therefore, the discovery phase serves more like a compass for the development effort instead of a tunnel vision dictating every inch of the path.

The foundational value of any discovery stage is challenging any assumptions.

• About users, what they want/need/love,
• what users are ready to pay for.

Lean becomes a synonym for learning about the target users. You get down user needs/wants/preferences and check what the market offers. Then you ask yourself, competitor X is already fulfilling the need Z, so why does the need still exist? What else the user is not telling us or not realizing?

Example: productivity app discovery

Take even a simple productivity app. This category dominates all app stores along with communication apps. Moreover, analysts project the productivity app market to grow by almost 15% by 2030. So, how come with such variety, the need still exists?

Well, there is always a new trend. Like a new big productivity coach with new research, with new books, events, and such. People jump on the bandwagon.

Then, there are already guides on how to select the perfect mix of productivity apps. What if instead of mixing, you develop a product that offers the most-wanted features together?

So, in the discovery phase, you can check a new trend, count books sold, and videos viewed, and estimate potential market. For that specific audience, you can

1) analyze the comments people leave,

2) determine the needs they express,

3) develop a solution.

In the process, you will get more than one need/wish/preference for your project.

Of course, it is not the entire process, and the process will differ depending on the product.

Going through the discovery phase helps you get avenues of unmet needs and user preferences that can turn into a profitable niche.

Process of the Lean Discovery Phase

The process of the Lean Discovery Phase will vary greatly. Depending on the vendor and the project. Lean methodology is selective of what is the most efficient for a particular project. So, only essential research and analysis are often prioritized. For example, you can check out Startup Services to see what will your lean discovery phase include.

Interview with a Business Owner

It all begins with the idea of the founder.

How did you get inspired to create this product?

How did you realize the need for it?

Often, ideas come from personal observations. And they give a starting point. There is always something where the idea resides. It is good practice to reach out to potential users from that segment and interview/survey them. Maybe there is a forum where potential users discuss it. Or maybe there are videos on the topic filled with discussions.

Sometimes, a founder often has an example of an existing product that is close to the one in mind. It is also worth looking at. It is a prospective candidate for competitor research. Plus, for further analysis, a business analyst might reach out to competitor’s customers who left reviews and interview them.

Technical Analysis of a Product Idea and Its Development

It is broken down into a few workshops among technical staff. Once — after the interview with a business owner. Then, after analysis of the market, competitors, and target audience. At least.

After all, product features depend on the target audience heavily. You usually get more than one User Persona. Your lean development team will surely start targeting the most promising one.

Overall, technical analysis is when the team discusses the architecture solutions. Which tech stack will be best for this project? They factor in current requirements as well as possibilities to pivot and scale if needed.

After all the research is done, the team finalizes the flow of the application and technologies to be used on the project.

Analysis of a Market, Target Audience, and Competitors

Market analysis is the most straightforward point on the list. The main idea is to check the size of the market. Whether it is growing or stagnant. It is also vital to detect any relevant trends.

Competitor analysis requires more effort. It is vital to scope competitor profiles:

• Their customer base and revenues
• Monetization strategies
• Technology stack and features
• Their marketing strategies

It allows your team to make sure your product can differentiate itself on the market.

Lastly, the target audience is the most interesting and expansive kind of research. There are many techniques. Yet, some of them are proven to be more cost-efficient than others. And they get the job done. In the lean methodology, these are a priority. As a result, you get User Personas with their demographics, pain points, and needs. Also, it often includes what kind of buying process they prefer.

Creation of Ongoing Specifications

Once the initial architecture workshop has been held and analysis done, it’s time to draft the technical features. According to the initial prototype, the user workflow is included in the document and broken down into features to be implemented. If there are multiple roles such as a registered user, guest user, administrator, etc. — then this is also a place to document this. This specification also already includes the division of logic between the backend and frontend. Marketing feature needs are also included.

Design of User Experience Wireframes

Once the specification is done, the prototypes become wireframes. They start to include many more details of the user experience. This is a key artifact to support a shared understanding of how the product should work. If any improvements in UX are required, they are analyzed here. We have outlined the importance of UX in our article 10 Best Practices For Mobile UX Design.

Why a Startup Owner Should Value the Lean Discovery Phase?

Benefit 1: Market-Oriented Product

Looking at the productivity app scenario above, you see that your starting point is the user. In the past, IT startups were all fueled by the idea or vision. People invested in ideas rather than grounded market and user research. One of the main reasons for the dot-com bubble back in the day. The Lean Discovery Phase is a safeguard against this. You never get to develop a product that somebody ‘feels’ users will like. Instead, you discover a need and scope the number of potential users. Also, you get a few more related needs worth checking.

Benefit 2: Start the Ongoing Project Documentation

It is important to back up any product vision with a specific project requirement document. The way this document(s) will look ranges from vendor to vendor. Usually, the more detail there is, the higher the price tag.

In lean methodology, this is rather simple. Based on the user need, your development team asks the question: “What features will allow us to test this?”. The second question is even more important: “What implementation level of features will be enough?”

• When you develop an MMP (minimum marketable product), any feature must lead to a purchase being made. So, it means a fuller feature set including checkout.
• For an MLP (lovable product), you need to see how many people will like and subscribe and then come back. This is rather a smaller feature set, but it includes user authentication.
• With an MVP (viable product), you just need to achieve leads and interactions. Then, you would know how viable a product is. This is the leanest feature set. You just need to track visitors and clicks.

So one feature will take up different development hours depending on the fullness of its implementation. However, it needs to become a shared understanding among all project stakeholders.

And it is likely that after a few iterations, the development plan will change significantly. This is the result of lean methodology and continuous learning. Plans change based on the incoming data from target users. That’s also why it is the Ongoing Project Documentation. It makes much more sense to do it this way compared to a detailed plan. A detailed plan will have to be completely revised after 2–3 sprints. It is just a lot of waste.

Benefit 3: Get the Prototypes

Again, there are no hard-and-fast rules.

• If it is an MVP, it can be just a low-fidelity schematic prototype developed in Figma. The point is that it is clickable so that every involved person can see what the digital product aims to do.
• If you are in for an MLP, usually it requires color and a more elaborate mock-up to convey that oomph that your target users will love.
• If it is an MMP and you’re looking to get investors — those prototypes must be polished and professionally presentable.

But what can be better than a clickable mock-up to make sure everyone is on the same page about the product? This is a rock-solid deliverable that ensures a shared understanding.

Benefit 4: Test Your Vendor

Within the Lean Discovery Phase, developers do not do any work yet. You mainly work with a project manager, a business analyst, or a product owner. Sometimes, UI/UX designers can join to create prototypes and wireframes. Your investment is minimal at this stage. So it is a good test for how well your cooperation is going. Think about questions such as:

• Does your vendor try to make sure there is an understanding between you?
• Does the vendor address your concerns effectively?
• Do they inform you in a manner that satisfies you?

Startup development can be a hectic and dynamic process, so you need to have people you can smoothly work with. Sure, the Lean Discovery Phase can run up to a couple of thousands of dollars. But developing an app would cost starting $10k price tag. So it makes sense to quality check the vendor’s expertise in action. To test whether Startup Services match your expectations. This way you can decide if that is the right partner for the startup journey.