Validation Strategies and Methods For Your Startup Idea

Getting enthusiastic about a startup idea can be a thrilling experience indeed. Just make sure that this sudden inspiration doesn’t completely cloud your judgment. Making sure that others are as enthusiastic about your idea as you are is vital to your startup’s success. Otherwise, it will just be an idea that could’ve been refined into something much more concrete and viable.

In order to start your idea, here are five validation methods that will turn your idea into reality.

Focus on the Problem

First of all, customers want to buy products that solve a particular problem they are having. For example, if they have a headache they get an aspirin. If they need something fixed they use duct tape and so on. Write down what your product is solving to see whether it is actually worth buying or not.

Does it help them stay fit or make them look more beautiful? Does it improve their lives in any way at all? If you start with your product and realize it’s not saleable then you’ve wasted time & effort for nothing.

Always make sure the product or service you are offering is useful to customers in some way, otherwise, it’ll be extremely difficult to commercialize it once it is out on the market.

Interview People

Got the initial problem-solving aspect of your startup all figured out? Great! Now it’s time to get some expert opinions on whether the startup idea is a future hit or a complete flop. Start by interviewing people in the relevant industry in question. Some of them have a lot of experience when it comes to launching startups.

Every successful entrepreneur had a few hiccups at first, don’t be afraid to try, absorb what they have to say, and learn from them. One of the most famous entrepreneurs of today, Sir Richard Branson, once said “you don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing and by falling over.” Therefore, learn from experience, yours or that of others, and don’t make the same mistakes others have already made in the past.

Conduct Surveys

Conducting surveys is essential for making any reliable startup validation. With this method you want to test how much are people willing to pay for such a product or service, you are offering, as well as the numbers behind it, to determine if there is a genuine demand for it.

Utilizing well-paid surveys is the best way to ensure the validity of your startup and will provide you with some quality assessment of your product. In the filming industry, they do the same with TV shows where they first release ‘pilot’ episodes to test the waters, and if the general public rates the episode high enough, then it will continue development.

These people are your future customers. It’s important to listen to their opinions or else you’ll find yourself with an empty market for your product.

Make a Mock Site

Another interesting method you could employ revolves around you building a ‘fake’ website to test the demand for the services you are offering. Similarly how teachers prepare students at school by giving mock tests beforehand to prepare them for the ensuing test.

Create a landing page for your customers to arrive to, and inform them of the products or services you are offering, along with the prices and get them to sign up with their emails so you can use those later on when you create your actual website.

This is a great way to analyze concrete data concerning the traffic generated by the startup. In addition, you should create an online store as well to check how many purchases have actually been made.

Get Feedback

Finally, finding some fresh eyes to view your startup from a different perspective is always a good idea. Sometimes we get too close to something that we completely lose sight of it. We are simply too subjective to notice some obvious flaws in our design.

Ask your friends and family to help out and provide you with some constructive criticism. Hitting a brick wall should not be the end of your startup idea. Let them give you a hand and climb over it, together, and then proceed with solving the remaining obstacles.

Dealing with potential problems and setbacks, and planning accordingly will make sure that your startup is ready for anything. As a result, the feedback received can be used to further enhance the startup. Start the validation process once again with this newer perfected version.

To sum up, having a neat idea about a startup is great. Don’t get carried away by the initial enthusiasm and validate it before launching the startup. Leave no stone unturned and you’ll find yourself with a potential startup that could take the market by storm.