How to Start a Business Even If You Are not Sure Аbout Your Idea?
As a would-be entrepreneur you probably have more than one idea. However, one common thing between all of that ideas is uncertainty.
Uncertainty will always follow entrepreneurs and businesses.
In such a way, you will make different analysis based on your personal characteristics and market possibilities to choose one idea that you think you can continue with.
But, what about if you are not sure about that idea? How you can start your business when you are not sure that it is the right thing for you?
Let’s look at some possibilities that can increase your potential to become sure about that business idea, or simply to go back and rearrange it.
#1 Talk with your family, cousins and friends about your idea.
They don’t want to be alone. They need to communicate their ideas and their current vision with different people to receive encouraging about their future steps.
That encouraging will increase their sureness about business startup.
#2 Talk with potential customers.
Sometimes your family, cousins and friends can’t be a valid source to encourage you about your own business idea. If they are not part of the customer segments, their thoughts are not valid for your and your future company.
You need more valid information that come directly from customer’s segments for which your business will solve problems or satisfy a need.
Simply, you will start talking with several potential customers about your vision, your idea and the benefits that your business can offer them. In such a way, you can receive better information and better ideas how you can improve your initial idea and increase your sureness about starting up.
#3 Start a blog on the theme of your business idea.
Because you already have different comments received from your family, cousins, friends and potential customers, you already know what’s the biggest pains on that potential market.
But, if you are still not sure, you can continue with the development of your business idea. Start blogging about it. Translate your ideas, vision and passion into the words that will communicate what you want to do.
Quickly, after you build enough reader base you can see what’s OK, and what can be wrong about your ideas. You can receive information from comments. You can see analytics about what’s most valued, and you can receive different emails with different possible improvements about your business idea.
You can also use questionnaires on your blog to research different areas of your idea.
All of that can encourage you to improve and start your business.
#4 Ask the social media community about your ideas.
As you build your blog, good idea is to start building social media community around your initial idea.
Share your thoughts on social media, help your community and ask different questions that can help you to improve your initial ideas and increase your encouraging to start a business.
#5 If you find that the idea is not worth starting, change the idea.
Simply, you don’t want to start a business from idea not worth starting.
If you follow previous advice, you will already have a sense, whether the idea is worth starting or not. If it is not, the best strategy is to start improving your initial business idea and to continue to talk about it. But, if you can’t change something in it, you can simply change the idea.
#6 Define the least features that you need to start building based on the previous steps.
When you have enough information directly from the market, you can start thinking about the least features that your products and services need to have based on the experience collected from the previous steps.
#7 Start building a prototype with the least features.
Because you already have a list with the minimal features that you need to include in your product or services, you already have potential customers base from your interviews, blog and social media community, you can start building prototype.
You need a prototype to ensure that the early adopters can use it and give you enough feedback to continue with the development process.
#8 Talk with possible early adopters of your products and services.
Until now, you have developed only few prototypes primarily intended to that early adopters from you ideal customer segment.
Your intention is to start talking with them about the features, possible improvements, pricing models, distribution channels and all different aspects of your future business.
Based on that information, you can rebuild your prototype and go further with other groups of early adopters of your products and services.
When you finally receive enough signs that your product is useful, early adopters as a part of your customer segment are willing to use and pay for them, you can expand your customer base.
#9 Measure customer feedback and improve your products and services.
Your job is not finished. As you expand your customers base, you will have different problems that need to be solved, and different customers that need to be served.
Continue with measuring customer feedback and improve your initial products and services based on that feedback.
When you find something wrong or unacceptable, change your business model and strategies.