35 per cent of all startups fail because they don’t align with a market need. More than 1 in 3 founders didn’t validate their core idea before starting it. You can’t afford to skip the first phase of the startup process. Too many ideas will die, and too many will try to be something they’re not. You might try on dozens of ideas before finding the ones worth pursuing. Here’s a simple, no-nonsense way to validate your startup idea.

🧨 Identify the ‘pain point’ first. Interview your potential customers. Get into their minds. What’s their real problem? Create open-ended questions. Search through industry reports and market data. Use Google Trends and Statista. Is the problem big enough? Research your competitors. If there is high competition, there is definitely a need… but you have to stand out.

⚓️ Second, make sure you can actually sell the thing. Ask potential customers whether they’d pay for it. Find out how much they’d pay and how they tend to buy. Test your solution with early versions. Look for commitments to pre-sales or pilot programmes. You’re on the right track if people are willing to buy your product before it’s even built. If creating a landing page attracts enough clicks that you’d be willing to run some ads behind it, then you probably have market interest. Run a targeted ad that drives enough people to a landing page demanding something for contact information. If they’re signing up, you have demand.

🎙 Get to proof of concept. Build a minimally viable product that solves a core problem. Launch early, often by bugging early adopters for feedback. Release a beta to a small group. Measure engagement and iterate based on real user input. 

💸 Finally, cash in. If you’re still on the freemium model, keep a close eye on how many of your users pay to take things to the next level. This will be your first clue about the value people place on what you’ve created. Experiment with pricing models to see what works and what doesn’t so you can pinpoint the best way to make money from your idea.