From Idea Storm to Prototype Sprint: How We Ran Our 4-Week Prototype Test Adventure

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Hey MoT community!
I wanted to share a behind-the-scenes look at how we set up and ran our 4-week prototype testing sprint for Epic Test Quest. It’s been an intense, eye-opening, and often emotional journey—and I hope it’s helpful or inspiring for anyone building something of their own.

The Idea Storm

It all started with a rapid-fire idea session between me and my co-founder.
Here’s how we did it:

  1. Each of us had 10 minutes to write down as many ideas as we could—no limits, no judgment.
  2. Then we swapped lists and spent another 10 minutes building on each other’s ideas, adding twists, combinations, or totally new ones.
  3. We repeated that for 3–4 rounds, ending up with around 100 ideas.

Some were wild. Some made us laugh. But the point wasn’t perfection—it was generative creativity. The more ideas we had, the more patterns, needs, and surprises we uncovered.

From Chaos to Clarity

Next, we went through all ideas together and rated them based on impact and alignment with our Unique Selling Proposition (USP) pillars:
:small_orange_diamond: Simple
:small_orange_diamond: Collaborative
:small_orange_diamond: Fun

We categorized ideas into “Need to have” vs “Nice to have” and eventually landed on 17 top ideas, most of them “needs.”
We then asked: Which of these are already validated? Which assumptions are still risky or unclear?

That gave us a working list of 16 core ideas, and from there, the real adventure began.

The Prototype Plan

A mentor suggested we test fast—one prototype per week. So we did.
To keep testers engaged, we gave each prototype a fun name and personality:

  • Prototype 1: Test-o-Matic 3000 (7.03 – 10.03)
  • Prototype 2: The Chatinator (14.03 – 17.03)
  • Prototype 3: Smash That Test (21.03 – 24.03)
  • Prototype 4: Planosaurus Rex (28.03 – 31.03)

I reached out to people I’d done discovery calls with, folks I met at TestBash and other events, MoT Slack connections—you name it.
Goal: At least 8 testers per prototype, with 1–2 new people each round.
Result: Avg. 12 testers per prototype, with 20 testers total across 4 weeks!

How We Ran It

Each prototype got its own Slack channel with instructions and context. Feedback was collected through Google Forms.
Choosing the right questions was hard—we definitely made mistakes. Some assumptions are still open because we didn’t ask things clearly enough. Lesson learned!

And honestly? The first round was tough.
It was the first time someone else tested a product I helped build—without me being there to explain or help.
Some feedback hit hard. But one of our coaches reminded me: “This is a gift. People cared enough to tell you the truth.”
That helped me reframe things—and made me so grateful for the thoughtful, time-intensive feedback we got.

After the Prototypes

We followed up with some individual interviews (time managment is still something I need to figure out more as I wanted to speak to more people), to go deeper on answers and ask how people wanted to stay involved. Now we’re wrapping those up and shaping what will go into our MVP.

And a Special Thanks


To this MoT community—thank you.
I wouldn’t have gotten here without you. From Slack convos to TestBash talks to friendly DMs, this space made all of this possible.

If you’re building something, need a sounding board, or want to jam ideas—my DMs are open. Let’s keep making testing more fun, collaborative, and impactful together.

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What a great statement! This sounds like an amazing adventure, both thoughtful and fun. Were there any results that were surprising?

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It was a rollercoaster of soo much but I definitely left on a huge high afterwards. I think the first prototype was definitely surprising as I needed to understand even if you say you only build a prototype and also write it in the instructions no edge case as it is a prototype, if that prototype looks like an MVP or an almost product people will try to use it to its fullest. So there were sadly a lot of the testers which couldn’t finish the flow as they got stuck in loops.

Also I was very bias towards my own prototypes so I never actually tested like I tested other products before that’s why that loop was even possible as I though ‘isn’t it clear just follow the instructions’.

We had sometimes some outliers in the results when over 80% found something super good that one tester didn’t like it at all. So I also learned from that to ask that one tester what was missing or wrong and not just enjoying the positive feedback and I learned tons from that as well.

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I’m always up for testing! If you are still looking for more :wink:

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thank you, you are on my list and I will reach out as soon as possible. We had to take some steps back after an expert coaching and need to check some riskiest assumptions before continuing down this path. Thank you for your patience

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Count me in also, if I can be adjusted somewhere :sweat_smile:
I would be happy to help.

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I would also be happy help and contribute to testing :slight_smile:

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thank you. I will send you the invite next week as I’m still figuring out some stuff around the MVP

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thats awesome thank you. Will send you the invite next week

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