Hi Blinders, I’m working on a business plan for an idea that I want to expand on and would like to understand the various elements of strategic and tactical approaches to get all my ideas out onto paper. Where should I start? Simple business plan? I’ve done this, but can’t quite lay out a clear roadmap just yet. Transparently speaking, my head goes in all sorts of directions, but I would like to start small and then expand on it. I can’t quite share the idea until it’s a bit more baked out, so keeping this pretty conceptual for now. Some of the steps I’ve started taking so far: -Business Plan (basic) -Networking with Manufacturers/Distribution vendors -Purchasing a Domain -Started thinking about website -Prototyping design and mock-ups -Designing the minimum viable product for a test -Exploring potential test markets eventually Would love your thoughts. TC: 275k #startup #business
Talk to customers and build an MVP. Business plan won't matter right now it you don't know what your customers want. Have to do the market research
Thanks! Is it worth doing market research without a full understanding of my product/service so that I can speak to it intelligibly? I’m thinking I finish conceptualizing first and building understanding and then tackle customer wants/needs/problems to be solved by conducting research. Starting with a Hypothesis atm.
Honestly I think you're complicating it. If you can't understand your own product, have you really understood your customers or the market? Find your customers pain points, build around that. Feel free to dm me we can chat easier
Any idea is worth nothing without execution. If you idea is worth a lot of money, make sure you execute accordingly. Delegate most of those tasks to specialists. You won't have time to focus on the business strategy if you spend your time thinking about surveys, domains and websites.
Thank you for the comment. At the moment, I’m a one man show until I have the idea worked out enough. If and when I get far enough down the line, I do intend on delegating to those that have industry knowledge.
That's your problem :-) You can't be a one man show and be successful (well, you can, but odds of success are extremely low). You need strategic partners and investors. NDA is your friend.
I think you have to assume that someone else already had the same idea. So what happened to them. IS there some unknown hurdle that stopped them? Do you need to raise Huge cash to complete? Or are there already competitors in the space? Could an existing giant copy your idea and throw some cash at it to take you out? IMO, don’t assume you have a unique idea. Find out who or what your competition is.
Yes the competitive space is fairly vacant or full of a few companies that are leaning on an old design of the same product with little to no IoT capabilities. The only other company I could research and find is not based in the US and their product design seems mediocre at best. Yes, a giant company could copy the idea technically and compete but I intend to secure the limited space available through distribution channels and lean on first mover advantage to stay ahead. At the very least, I’ll eventually begin to compete with someone, yes. This doesn’t distract me away from my mission though.
Any idea why you would be the first mover? Is there a big starting hurdle? Otherwise sounds like a good opportunity.
I feel you are jumping on to solving the how without fleshing out the why, MVP etc. Do you have a problem statement - is it clear? A couple of user stories? A MVP to test and iterate on?
Thanks for the comment. Yea, I have a clear problem statement that is addressing the need/want for the product. It also addresses a B2B and B2C customer base. I just don’t have customer or investor backing yet since it’s still in its raw form. I have MVPs in mind that I can form relationships for any tests.
order of operations is backwards
Hi! Thanks. Care to elaborate? My list is in no specific order. Open to thoughts on how to be effective.
you don’t “Exploring potential test markets **eventually**”. you do that immediately. you don’t even need the MVP to do that. don’t build anything before selling it first
Talk to potential customers ASAP To validate the idea
Thank you for the suggestion. Yes, this is something I hope to do once I can gain a solid understanding and design a survey for potential customers. I also hope to do live interviews with customers to garner feedback.