You Can Turn Your Scrappy Ideas To Profitable Companies By Doing These Things
No ideas sounds reasonable when it is birthed and I don’t want you to tell me Bill Gate’s idea of Microsoft was different.
Flash back to a couple of decades ago, Bill would tell you he didn’t imagine Microsoft would become more than a crappy box (computer) that analyses simple data, processes and turn them to information to becoming one of the most powerful tools in the world.
What does this mean?
Every idea is a crappy scrappy idea unless you know how exactly to make a company out of it.
Everybody in the world develops new ideas from time to time but there are just very few successful entrepreneurs out there and if you’re reading this, you’re either an entrepreneur or a wannabe.
Whichever the case may be, i want you to know that it is very possible to be in the corner of your room or be on a mission on Pluto yet build a company on earth.
Before you ask me how this is possible and how to go about it, I’d quickly tell you that I wished I knew this a couple of years ago, i might just be the next youngest billionaire the world ever produced.
Let’s dive in. Here’s my first question:
Everybody does and like I said, ideas begin from basic thoughts passing through your mind. You probably must have identified a problem or a glitch in a system or thought there could be a better way to get something done.
Now that’s an idea and if you’re not yet convinced that you have great ideas that could turn to companies, I’d strictly recommend that you pay attention to your observations and questions. Let me give you an example of the “not-so-many-ideas” that crosses my mind
- Why do dog owners take their dogs to the veterinary doctors when the veterinary doctors can come over?
- Why jog daily as an exercise routine when i can just walk and cover a number of kilometers
- Why is tourism mostly about traveling and camping in locations?
These thoughts are random, but they are products of observations of glitches in different systems i go through daily. Does this sound like the next Apple, Amazon or Google?
Well, sure they do, to me but might not to you.
So, here’s the point; anybody, even you can come up with amazing ideas.
What do you do with your ideas?
If you’ve asked this question before, it’s fine. It’s the next step in building that amazing companies.
The simple answer to it is that you get down to work with it and make money out of it.
I will give you the practical steps to take to ensure that this idea brings back some good money in the bank for you.
Every idea begins as stupid thoughts or valid observation but not all ideas can become successful companies. The first thing you need to do is to make sure the problem you identified is valid and a pain in the ass.
There are several ways to validate your ideas, but do these three things and I’d guarantee you’ve solved this part.
a. Conduct a small research online:
Go to google, YouTube or any platform you use and ask questions relating to the problem you’ve identified. You could be lucky enough to stumble on people who have worked on similar ideas and learn from them.
You can also discover people talking about the problem and what exactly they are doing about it. These information would be used as a data to build correctly.
b. Conduct real time research:
You can visit the locations where you identified the glitch and ask specific questions, or you can conduct surveys and send it directly to the group involved to gather real data. Assumptions are costly. You can use Google Forms or Jotform
Here’s a list of the right questions you should be asking yourself to validate your idea;
a. Do people need this idea?
b. Where are they?
c. How bad is the problem they’re facing?
d. Are they willing to pay for it?
e. How much are they willing to pay?
f. How much will i make on average from this?
g. Is this idea sustainable?
These questions are so important because you can have people need your idea and are willing to pay but very few. This might result to spending more cost and making lower revenue.
2. Test your idea on a small scale;
If you believer a million people will buy your product, the dumbest thing to do is to go make 1 million products then begin to try to sell. You must test your idea on different levels.
The simple ways to test your idea is either by
a. Going directly to the target audience and selling to them Or
b. Running Ads with the product/idea offer and observe their reactions.
A lot of entrepreneurs have failed because they do not take this as a priority. If a thousand people cannot buy your product, then a million will not.
The reason for testing on a small scale is to be able to understand the response your target consumers make to the product. This feedback would help you better iterate the product so you must ensure you focus on their feedback more than anything.
3. Build an audience:
Scrappy ideas are dumb ideas to other persons but you. The truth however is that you can build an audience to believe this “stupid thing” really matter to them.
I built a product a couple of weeks ago and built an audience for it. Instead of jogging as an exercise routine which I believe wears me out, I decided to walk instead by taking 6000 steps daily.
So, I created a social media handle and bought a domain name with 6000steps.
Everyday, i take these walks from 6am and people join me from other states whom I’ve never met.
It’s still a small community and if you’re willing to join me, email me at ajayijohel@gmail.com with the subject: 6000steps and I’d add you to my email list.
Trust me, taking walks are better than jogging. The point here is that you must build an audience for these your scrappy idea and you can build your audience through any platform; Whatsapp, Email, Facebook etc
To build an audience, you’d need to start from a small group, win their trust, tell them to get more people or give offers that will draw people in.
Few things to do when you are convinced of your idea;
- Get a name that sounds convincing and easy to remember for the idea
- Get a social media handle for it where you can grow an audience. It must be on the relevant platforms where your audience can be grown
- Buy a domain name to secure it. You don’t necessarily need to build a platform for it immediately
- Spread the word and give out value
- Build a team when necessary
If you enjoyed reading this article and you’re an entrepreneur building products or offering services or you want to be one, I’d want you to join our community of entrepreneurs where i teach via podcasts, videos and blogs on how to start, grow and scale your company on www.climbr.xyz
Sign up is free.
Ajayi Joel
Originally published at https://johelski.medium.com on October 30, 2020.
