Minimum Viable Web Series

This post comes from Jeremy Campbell who's the Founder and President of Spidvid.

I love reading a book or two per month! I recently read The Lean Startup by Eric Ries. The book's core premise is that startups should build a minimal viable product (MVP), release it, get feedback, learn, iterate, and rapidly shape the product towards establishing a solid product-market fit.

How this methodology applies to web series project development is that perhaps you shouldn't create many episodes in a series, or develop a full web series until you know it will work and get traction. A minimal viable web series (MVWS) if you will.

So maybe instead of writing a script for an 8 episode web series, you should write pilots for 4 potential shows, produce those one by one starting with the one deemed to have the most potential first, see which one of them resonates best with viewers, and then develop that particular series fully. Pilots are a good way to learn about how your viewers would like to see the story develop (and if the story is strong enough to move forward in the first place), and which characters are liked and which ones aren't.

This is something to think about, always try to do extraordinary things but minimize the risks associated with developing original content. Create something fast, release it, learn, and you should have a better idea of what can work longer term.

And of course by all means, if you're passionate about a story and want to see it all the way through then go for it because nothing feels better than creating something you love. If a topic or subject makes you feel good inside, then go for it no matter what others may say to you.