A Concierge MVP is a manually delivered version of a product where a human performs the service instead of software. It validates the value proposition and workflow before investing in automation, and teaches you exactly what to build.
Complex workflows with high automation risk, or when the right service design is unclear before building. Particularly valuable in B2B.
- Identify the service or workflow you want to eventually automate
- Recruit 1-3 pilot customers willing to participate in an early access programme
- Perform the service manually: spreadsheets, emails, or direct communication
- Charge real money if possible — free pilots don't produce honest feedback
- Observe closely: what does the customer actually need? What surprised you?
- Only automate the parts that are stable, well-understood, and genuinely scalable
Before building an automated artist promotion tool, Spotify's partnerships team manually curated playlist placements for 10 independent artists — sending weekly reports and adjusting placement based on streaming data. After 8 weeks they understood exactly what data artists cared about, which informed every field in the eventual self-serve artist analytics dashboard.
Please contact the author for more information on these examples at linkedin.com/in/kshitijrege
- Scaling the concierge too long — it should be a time-limited learning exercise
- Not being transparent with clients that the service is currently manually produced
- Focusing on delivering a good service rather than on learning — the goal is insight
- The Lean Startup — Eric Ries