How novel should the idea be?
Paul W asked 2 years ago
Hi folks
I’m not new to entrepreneurship but I feel like I’m starting all over again some days 🙂
I’m evaluating several startup ideas and I’ve noticed a common theme in a lot of our ideas: many are market pull problems that appear to be not fully solved but there are existing products that claim to be solutions. In other words we see major problems, and there are other companies with the same basic idea but yet the problem is still rampant. It looks like there are solutions but they don’t appear to be widely deployed. E.g. for one of our startups there is a health related device that we found on the market that is pretty similar to what we wanted to create. The company appears to be at least successful enough to have a polished e-commerce site and lots of press, but yet I’ve not found anyone using it, and the target customers are still experiencing the “pain”.
I have found it discouraging when we identify what appear to be real problems, but find another company that found the same problem and is already in the market.
We seem to be focused on ensuring our business idea is completely novel, and I’m wondering if we are too focused on that and missing out on opportunities.
My question, how important is novelty alone when it comes to forming business ideas? What I’m finding is that we explain our idea to potential stakeholders, they do a google search and find something similar in the market and tell us it’s already been done.
My intuition is that existing solutions don’t have wide adoption for a reason. It might be that the competition is successful but only in a niche market and there are broader markets or other niches that are still opportunities.
Has anyone else been faced with this dilemma of “it’s been done” but yet you have this nagging feeling there is still a big opportunity?
thanks!
Paul
Bill Aulet answered 2 years ago
Paul,
This is a very common impediment to entrepreneurs and it should not be. I like a situation that is like that you describe – specifically “I have found it discouraging when we identify what appear to be real problems, but find another company that found the same problem and is already in the market.” That means there is a real problem. On the flip side, your comments of “We seem to be focused on ensuring our business idea is completely novel, and I’m wondering if we are too focused on that and missing out on opportunitie,” gets to the point that you are too obsessed with “invention”. Over history we have seen that value is only created when invention (i.e., something novel – tech, process, idea, business model, etc.) is combined with commercialization (i.e., find the customer who will benefit from this new idea and getting it into their hands in a vialbe product and then iterating on it to make it better and better). Was Facebook a novel and new idea? Heck no! MySpace and Friendster where among the others who had already tried it. Facebook just executed it much better. Same with Apple – before they came out with the MacIntosh, iPod, iPhone, there were other similar products but Apple just pulled it all together. Has anything Microsoft every done been original? No. Old saying, it is 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration so don’t worry about the novelty. Just figure out how to execute and win customers, iterate rapidly to constantly improve and set traps for those who try to follow you.
Paul W answered 2 years ago
Thank you Bill! Your point is well taken. And Tesla was far from the first electric car! I was curious about your comment about \”setting traps\”. Can you explain that a bit further? Many Thanks, Paul
Paul W answered 2 years ago
Thank you Bill! Your point is well taken. And Tesla was far from the first electric car! I was curious about your comment about \”setting traps\”. Can you explain that a bit further? Many Thanks, Paul