Have you got a business idea that you can’t stop thinking about, but no real way of knowing whether anyone would actually pay for it?
You’re not alone. We hear a version of this conversation constantly. Someone’s had an idea, they’ve told a few people, everyone’s been encouraging, and now they’re stuck wondering whether “encouraging” means “this is genuinely good” or just means “your friends are being nice to you.”
Those are two very different things.
We’ve watched people spend months, and sometimes serious money, building something before they had any real evidence anyone wanted it. We’ve also watched people talk themselves out of good ideas because they were too scared to actually test them properly.
This isn’t a validation framework with seventeen steps and a spreadsheet template. It’s simply how we’d go about it if the idea were ours: talk to real people, look for actual evidence, and try to find out as cheaply and quickly as possible whether we’re onto something or kidding ourselves.
Before We Go Any Further
This is our view, based on what we’ve seen work and what we’ve seen fail.
We’ve watched brilliant ideas succeed. We’ve watched what looked like terrible ideas somehow do very well. We’ve also watched ideas that looked perfect on paper go absolutely nowhere.
Have a look around, speak to a few other people who’ve started something, and make your own judgement. What follows is simply how we’d approach it.
What Problem Are You Actually Solving?
Start here, because most people skip it.
If you can’t explain, in one sentence, the actual problem your idea solves for a real person, that’s the first thing to sort out. Not the product. The problem.
“People need better coffee” is not a problem. “Office workers near the station spend fifteen minutes queuing for average coffee before 9am and are visibly annoyed about it” is a problem. You can test the second one. The first one is just a vibe.
We’d ask yourself:
- Who exactly has this problem?
- How are they currently dealing with it?
- What does it currently cost them, in time, money or hassle?
- Would they actually notice if it was solved, or is it a minor inconvenience they’ve long since stopped thinking about?
If you’re struggling to answer those, you probably don’t have a business idea yet. You have the beginning of one.
Would Real People Actually Pay for This?
Here’s where most self-testing falls apart. People ask the wrong audience the wrong question.
Asking your partner, your mates or your family whether they think your idea is “good” tells you almost nothing useful. They love you. They want you to succeed. They are, quite understandably, going to be nice about it.
What actually matters is whether a complete stranger, who has no reason to spare your feelings, would hand over money for it.
So go and find them. Not people you know. Real potential customers, the sort of person you’d actually be selling to. Message people in relevant online communities. Stand outside the place your customer already goes. Cold message people on LinkedIn if that’s where your buyer lives. It will feel uncomfortable. Do it anyway.
And don’t ask them “would you buy this?” Almost everyone says yes to a hypothetical, because it costs them nothing to be polite. Ask instead:
- “How do you currently deal with this problem?”
- “What have you tried before?”
- “What did that cost you, or how much time did it take?”
- “What would it be worth to you to have that fixed?”
If people struggle to describe the problem, or clearly aren’t bothered by it, that’s a genuinely useful answer. It’s just not the answer you were hoping for.
“I love seeing people get excited about an idea. I just want that excitement to survive an actual conversation with a real stranger before anyone spends any money on it.”
What’s the Cheapest Way to Test It This Week?
You do not need to build the full thing to find out whether it works.
You need the smallest, cheapest, quickest version that still lets a real person try to give you money, or at least commit to something, for the actual problem you’re solving.
This is where a lot of people get it backwards. They build first, then go looking for customers. We’d do it the other way round.
Some examples of what “small” can look like, depending on what you’re doing:
- A single landing page describing the offer, with a genuine way to register interest or pre-order.
- Doing the service manually yourself for the first five customers, before automating or systemising anything.
- A simple product mock-up you show people in person and ask them to commit a deposit against.
- A waiting list you actually have to work to fill, not one you quietly set up and forget about.
The point of all of these is the same: get to a genuine yes or no as fast and cheaply as possible, before you’ve committed real money to premises, stock, software or staff.
A hypothetical example, purely to illustrate the point. Say someone wants to start a meal-prep delivery service for people who work shifts. Instead of building an app, hiring a kitchen and printing menus, the cheapest test might be: cook forty portions themselves in their own kitchen, post about it in two local shift-worker Facebook groups, and see whether twenty strangers actually pay upfront for a week’s worth. If they can’t sell forty portions to strangers with a phone and an oven, an app and a commercial kitchen aren’t going to fix that. If they sell out in a day, that’s real evidence worth building on.
We haven’t run that particular business. It’s an illustration, not a case study. But the logic holds for almost any idea you’re sitting on.
Liking an Idea Isn’t the Same as It Being a Business
This is the bit people find hardest to hear.
You can genuinely love an idea, believe in it completely, and it still not be commercially viable. Those two things are entirely separate, and confusing them is probably the single biggest reason good, well-intentioned people lose money.
Loving an idea is about you. A business working is about whether enough other people have a problem, feel it strongly enough, and are willing to pay what it costs you to solve it, regularly enough to build something around.
We’d genuinely encourage you to sit with that question honestly: are you excited because you’ve found a gap in the market, or because the idea is fun to think about? Both feelings are real. Only one of them pays the bills.
That doesn’t mean abandon everything you’re not immediately sure about. Plenty of good businesses take a while to find their shape, and the first version of an idea often isn’t the version that ends up working. The point is to stay honest with yourself about which evidence you’re actually getting, rather than only hearing the bits that confirm what you already wanted to believe.
“There’s a difference between an idea you’re proud of and an idea somebody will pay for. Ideally you end up with both. If you can only have one, pick the one people will pay for.”
So, What Should You Actually Do?
Here’s roughly how we’d approach it, in order:
- Write down the problem in one sentence, not the solution.
- Find fifteen to twenty real strangers who fit your target customer, not friends or family.
- Ask them about the problem, not your idea. Listen more than you talk.
- Look for people already spending time, money or effort trying to solve it themselves.
- Build the cheapest possible version that lets someone actually commit, ideally with real money.
- Try to get a genuine yes from strangers before you spend a penny on branding, premises or software.
- Track actual commitments, not compliments. A “that’s such a good idea” is worth nothing. A deposit is worth something.
- If it doesn’t land, work out honestly whether the problem was the idea, the audience, or the price, before deciding whether to adjust or move on.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many people should I talk to before I know if an idea is any good?
There’s no magic number, but somewhere around fifteen to twenty real conversations with genuine potential customers usually starts to show a pattern. If you’re hearing the same objection or the same enthusiasm repeatedly by conversation ten, you’re learning something real.
Is it enough if my friends and family say they’d buy it?
Not really. People close to you are naturally supportive, and their opinion, while well-meant, doesn’t tell you much about how a stranger with no emotional investment in you would behave. Test with people who have no reason to be kind.
Do I need a business plan before I test an idea?
No. A business plan is useful once you have some evidence the idea works. Testing comes first. Writing forty pages about a business nobody’s confirmed they want is usually just a well-organised way of avoiding the uncomfortable bit.
What if people say they love the idea but don’t actually buy?
That’s genuinely useful information, even if it’s disappointing. Enthusiasm without commitment usually means the problem isn’t painful enough, the price is wrong, or you’re talking to the wrong audience. Dig into which one it is before assuming the whole idea is dead.
How do I test a service idea rather than a physical product?
Do the service yourself, manually, for a small number of real paying customers before you try to systemise or scale anything. If you can’t get five people to pay you to do the thing by hand, adding software or staff won’t fix that.
Should I build a website before testing the idea?
Not a full one. A single simple page explaining the offer, with a genuine way to express interest or pay, is usually enough at this stage. Save the proper website build for once you know the idea has legs.
What if I test it and the idea genuinely doesn’t work?
Then you’ve saved yourself months of effort and a fair amount of money finding that out cheaply, rather than expensively. That’s not failure. That’s the whole point of testing something before you commit to it properly.
Our Final View
We think most business ideas are worth exploring. Genuinely.
But an idea is not a business until real strangers have shown you, with their time or their money, that they actually want it.
Talk to people outside your own circle. Ask about the problem before you pitch the solution. Build the smallest, cheapest version you can and see whether anyone commits to it. Then be honest with yourself about what the evidence actually says, rather than what you want it to say.
Go for it. Just test it properly first.
Thinking About Starting Something and Want Another Perspective?
If you’ve got an idea you’re turning over and you’re not sure whether it’s worth pursuing, give us a call.
You don’t need a polished pitch or a business plan. Just talk us through the problem you think you’re solving and who you think has it. Sometimes it genuinely helps to say it out loud to someone who’s watched a fair few ideas go both ways.
Pick up the phone. We’re always happy to talk it through.