A playbook for Generating Business Ideas

3. Scaling Efficiently and Mitigating Risk
Ideally, after you identify a few people that have the problem and/or want the
product, you can start going to more and more people and finding different types
of people that also want the product.
Facebook started just on Harvard’s campus. Then it went to other college
campuses. Then it went across the world to all kinds of different people.
So think about what other schools have law programs, what other schools have
heavy workloads, what other programs at Harvard have heavy workloads, or
what other programs at other schools have heavy workloads.
Again, go talk to those people, conduct a customer development interview, and
generally see if they have similar problems to you and want what you want.
There is a risk that only a few people that are just like you want your business
idea, but it’s a far greater risk that no one else wants your business idea.

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It’s a lot more expensive and time-consuming to test your idea on one hundred
million people than it is to test your idea on ten people.
I have included a lot more advice on this topic of testing your ideas, customer
development, etc., later in this book. I also wrote an entire book on customer
development called “
Customer
Development
for
Entrepreneurs
.” It is essentially
a tactical guide to Lean Startup principles. Check it out
here
.
Key Takeaways
One of the biggest risks a startup business faces is solving a problem no one has.
By solving a problem you have, you mitigate the risk that no one else has the
problem. It’s also easier to learn about the problems that you have than it is to
learn about the problems others have.
Make sure that you are not the only one who has the problem you want to solve
or who wants the product or service you want. After identifying a problem you
have, create a customer persona and conduct some customer development
interviews to test your idea in a time-and capital-efficient way.

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Chapter 5: Ask Your Customers
“The way to get startup ideas is not to try to think of startup ideas. It’s to look
for problems…”

“Why do so many founders build things no one wants? Because they begin by
trying to think of startup ideas.”
– Paul Graham, Y-Combinator These quotes from Paul Graham illustrate the
importance of looking for problems rather than looking for “startup ideas.” As
discussed previously in this book, solutions to problems can make for some of
the best business ideas. The first quote suggests that it’s best to focus your time
and energy on looking for problems rather than just looking for ideas.
It’s great to come up with ideas, but if they will not help you start a business,
and if starting a business is your goal, it may not be as productive as finding
problems. An idea may or may not be a solution to a problem. A problem will
bring you much closer to a business idea than a random idea.
The methodology discussed in this chapter is designed to focus on identifying
problems. It starts by picking a customer segment you want to serve. This
chapter includes guidance on how and why to choose a customer segment. The
next step is to conduct customer development interviews with the customer
segment to identify what problems they have and what solutions (business ideas)
would be of value to them.

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