Messaging MVP
A texting feature shipped in two weeks, not two quarters.
- Company
- JUMP Software
- Role
- UX Designer
- Team
- PM · Engineering · Designer
- Year
- May 2019
Context
JUMP helps local businesses manage their online presence. A competitive gap surfaced messaging as a churn risk, with no time for a full research cycle.
Problem
01 / 04
Build a messaging feature with no research backing it — only the signal that competitors had it and our churn was higher. The team needed buy-in and a defensible scope, fast.
Research
02 / 04
One week of lightweight, high-signal discovery aimed at validating intent and scoping the MVP.
- →In-app AppCues survey on channels, frequency, and interest
- →Competitive analysis of messaging-feature patterns
- →Hypotheses framed as business + customer outcomes
Findings
03 / 04
Strong demand for SMS specifically — not chat integrations. Appointments and SMS marketing led intent; 75% of SMBs had no CRM.
""If you had the ability to message customers I never would have left." — Brooke Anderson, Nerf Arena"
Solution
04 / 04
An MVP scoped to functional, reliable, usable — send and receive SMS, nothing else. Ship to a beta cohort and let usage drive the next round of features.
- →Send/receive SMS as the core loop
- →A/B tested entry points; icon-in-table won over top-right CTA
- →Milestones sequenced so dev could ship incrementally
Selected artifacts
Research, exploration, and final screens from the work.
Impact
- 01
Cross-functional buy-in secured in one week of discovery
- 02
Shipped a beta MVP to production for live user research
- 03
Established the pattern for future feature scoping at JUMP
Reflection
"Startups reward proportional research. The win was matching method to constraint — not skipping research, just sizing it to the decision."