PAUL: It’s Paul.

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FLORIN: It’s Florin. What are we grinding today?

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PAUL: Florin, should we grind today some thoughts about validation? Because everyone is talking about it. And you gave me a few minutes ago some good examples of books and people that are talking about it. Maybe you can say them again for our listeners.

How to Implement Startup Idea Validation Methods

FLORIN: Yeah, definitely. So we have great people like Eric Riis, Steve Blank, Ash Mayura, and a bunch of other guys have written some very interesting ideas on how to validate, on actually why you need to validate everything that goes on into the process of planning your brand new business, the brand new business that you are trying to launch. And instead of going and building something that nobody wants, they all teach you that you should validate every little thing, every little aspect. This has created a huge demand for understanding startup idea validation methods. Because everybody asks me at conferences, at events, they ask me, Okay, so we get it, we need to validate, but how is validation done? How do you do validation? I need to validate this really small piece of my business model. How do I go about validating this exact part? And at all the events that I’ve been to, nobody could actually tell you how to do that type of validation. Everybody’s like, Well, learn about customer development. And you could learn about customer development. There are great books on customer development and learning what people would need from your business, what type of business they would need, what problem they need solving and other stuff like that.

But it still doesn’t help you how do you validate this sales channel? How do you validate this pricing model? How do you validate this price point? How do you validate X, Y, and Z? And we are going to do a small series on Startup Espresso just for you, just to let you know how you can validate every little thing. So each episode will be a type of startup idea validation methods that you could do and how to do it, because you already know the why from these amazing experts and these amazing authors. And now from Startup Espresso, you will learn how to validate each small thing because you know why you need to do it and now you will see how you can do it.

PAUL: Since we’re talking of validation, because we’re also in the process of validating what is interesting for you, please let us know on our Facebook group on Startup Express if you think that this content is valuable for you, what ideas would you like to listen for us? Because there is still a validation from our side also about what content we should bring to you so it’s most useful. Actually, this came up from the experience that I had together with my co founders. We were all technical people, which was hard for us to validate because it’s easy to write code because it’s only you and computer. But startup idea validation methods require more effort because you need to interact with people and challenge your assumptions.

FLORIN: Yeah, and you’re happy because you’re working on something that feels real.

PAUL: Nobody tells you that it’s not okay what you’re doing because you think that everybody wants that product. Validating, it takes you out of your comfort zone because you will need to discuss with people. You will need to understand that maybe you assume something which is not actually like that. I think it’s this first episode, we should focus on this part by validating if the problem is real. I think you call it interest validation.

FLORIN: Am I right? Yeah, I call it interest validation. Why? You basically want to validate the fact that there is or there is not any interest in the type of thing that you are trying to build. You see, I use the word type of thing. So it’s not like this thing specifically, this type of thing. I’m thinking about doing something in this space that would look something like this, this, or that, and I’m not sure which one of them I want to build as a final product. I have some ideas on what those should look like, but I’m actually trying to see if I could get anybody interested in trying out one of those products. So I shouldn’t build anything if I don’t validate that there’s an interest in using something that I’m planning to build.

PAUL: Does it actually need to be of interest from other people or I can start that it’s interest in it? Because I’m thinking a little bit. Look, for example, when we tried to build the medical advice app, the interest from our side was to build something that would help us. Because, for example, in that situation, we are using a lot of text messages with some friend of ours, which is a doctor, to get medical advice. At least for me, there was interest to build that because it would have been useful for me. So, can personal interest count as a startup idea validation method?

FLORIN: You see, this is why I actually like talking to you on all of these podcasts and in real life when we’re just randomly talking about random stuff, because we can get to really impressive things and really impressive details. Yeah, well, what you just said, that’s the best reason you should be building your startup when you have a problem and you are trying to solve it. Now, there is one small thing here. You should do that, but you should also make certain by doing interest validation that there are tons of other people in this world who have the same problem that you are already trying to solve. That’s the best point that you could get to with building a startup when you want it because you had a problem, you’re trying to build it, but then make sure that you find at least 1,000 or a million people who also have the same problem and want that thing done for them?

PAUL: Okay. So in order to find them, I actually need to know who they are, right? And where to look after them. Because it’s not enough to come and tell you, Florin, I know there are like a thousand of people interested in this.

FLORIN: Yeah, I would instantly go and say, How do you know that? Can you show me any details, any research that you are 100 % sure that those thousand people exist in the world? Because if you can show me a list, it means that you already have some idea on how you would target them and sell them your product. But if you don’t know and you just think that there are a thousand or a million people in the world, then I’m really not interested in discussing this further because it’s very clear that you haven’t done any interest validation.

PAUL:Okay, so let’s go a step further then. And I will tell you that, hey, Florine, I have a thousand mothers who are on this Facebook group where I drop this landing page that promises medical advice for kids and 300 of them sign up. Is that a good startup idea validation method?

FLORIN: Well, yes, because you give me a very concrete number. There’s like a thousand people and you got 30 % sign ups. It’s really good.

PAUL: With the promise of having an app that will allow them to get medical advice for their kids.

FLORIN: That’s a great example of how you could be doing this.

PAUL: I somehow validated the interest a little bit. Now I should move further with the validation, right? I shouldn’t just start building the product because it’s not validated enough.

FLORIN: No, you shouldn’t build the product yet. You should move to other ideas. First, you’re not very sure if they would actually do something more with the app. You should see this is a very good example that you would get signups, but you shouldn’t start building it because you don’t know if this is going to go further along. Further along, maybe you need to validate some other things. You have validated the interest from a standpoint of signups, but would they use it every day, for example? How often do they have this problem and there are other steps that you need to validate.

PAUL: You said that how often would they have this problem. So actually, I think I rushed things a little bit. So even if I have those signed up, I should still validate more that they actually have the problem and they need to talk with somebody about their kids for medical purposes. Exactly. So I should stay more in that Facebook group, maybe, from where I got the sign ups and look what they are complaining about, what they are discussing about there.

FLORIN: I have a couple of ideas on how you can do validation and customer development. And the next point would be to start taking the people who signed up, who had the interest of using, to get them on to a couple of interviews, to a series of interviews. And if you want, we can make another.

PAUL: Episode in. 

FLORIN: Which to discuss. In which to discuss about, you’ve already got this, what are the next steps that you need to validate? And then we can move on to the next steps because there are still a couple of things to discuss at this step right here because you had a very clear example of how you could find people for the app that you’re trying to build, and it’s a really good example. But there are other examples of how you could do interest validation. So if you want to do this, you’ve instantly thought about Facebook groups. But then you can also think about forums because maybe there are some markets or areas of a certain market where people still use forums. You can even see, like you said, Facebook groups. Then you can see comments on blog posts and get a lot of details from the comments on different blog posts. If they are about parenting, maybe you can see on a lot of different sites, a lot of people have different comments. Maybe from those comments you can extract the idea that they would need medical advice from somebody who would help them as parents with their kids.

PAUL: I think that what you just told me here is that if I’m a good developer and I want to build a product, I should not build a product that I think is doing something. But first, I should look, I don’t know, on Google, on Twitter, on forums, or all these channels.

FLORIN: You.

PAUL: Tell me about actual problems that people are complaining about and start making notes about it. I see on Quora that somebody’s complaining about, I don’t know, how hard it is to find good viewers for your games, for example.

FLORIN: Definitely. You could then validate that problem by looking at related search queries on Google or reading comments on blog posts. This approach uses multiple startup idea validation methods to triangulate interest.

PAUL: I will continue after that. I’m looking, okay, let’s see on Twitter forums what the people are complaining about regarding game reviews or something like that. I’m looking at the existing players in the market that are trying to solve this, what other complaints are about it? If it’s a mobile app, I don’t know. I look on the app store on Google Play to see are people always complaining about something?

FLORIN: Yeah. You can even look at search queries. On Google, if you see there’s a lot of search queries, a lot of people searching for, how do I get reviews for my game? How can you get your game reviewed? How can you get professional reviewers for a game? Or other search queries that all of them imply that the solution would be to have a service that offers you people to review your games, then if that’s what the startup you’re trying to build, then that’s a great way to validate interest because let’s say that I would think about, yeah, so I’m going to make this community where you just sign up as a company and then you have a whole bunch of people reviewing your games and I’m going to make this access very easy to you and I’m going to totally disrupt this market. And if that’s the case, then it’s awesome because by what we’ve just discussed, you’ve discussed about that on Quora, and then me with the search queries and with the other places where you can validate interest, we could definitely see that there is interest in the market and there would be a lot of people searching for ways in which they can get reviews for their game.

So if I come along and build a platform for that, I’m going to get tons of signups and that’s what the data shows me. So that’s my very initial research. I usually call this in my five step customer development program, I call this phase zero, because this is the first thing that you need to get. Will there be anybody interested in what I’m trying to build? And this is an easy way and a bulletproof way to see if there’s interest.

PAUL: And since you call this the phase zero in the five phases program that we discuss about, to move to the next phase, I assume there is the outcome of this interest, which might be that, yes, there is interest. No, there is no interest. Now, if yes, I think it’s obvious to move to the next thing and maybe we’ll discuss in another episode about this. But if not, what should I do?

FLORIN: Yeah, you should, if not, then you should go and try something else.

PAUL: Because I think here is the complicated part for you to understand that there is not a need for what you’re trying to build.

FLORIN: Yeah, it’s interesting to discuss this, really, because if you’re doing something in a very classic or interesting market, then you will find search queries for it. But if you’re building something that’s so disruptive and so alien and so wow and so blue ocean, you will not see Google search queries for that because it’s way too new and people didn’t even think that they have that problem yet.

PAUL: Yeah, here I wanted to get it because I’m thinking now if there would have been Google when Henry Ford was leaving, I think that if he would look at Google queries, he wouldn’t have find a lot of interest for cars in that period.

FLORIN: Yeah, I agree. And that’s why you should look at it like, maybe people in that age, in that period, would have been looking on Google for stuff like, how can I get there faster?

PAUL: Exactly.

FLORIN: And if you can validate this interest, so it’s not like I want a faster horse, but I want to go from A to B faster, then you could build a whole bunch of products. You could build airplanes, cars, trains, anything that could get you from A to B but faster because that’s what you are looking for. And if you understand this small detail, then you can go back to everything that me and Paul discussed today and think about searching on forums, on Facebook groups after these small tiny details. Do you want something done faster, better with more customer service, with a hands on experience or with white gloves? Hands-on experiences when somebody helps you, like hands on to set something up. Or maybe you want a white glove service when you don’t even have a headache with setting things up because you paid the company to make all the set up for you. And there’s a lot of these very interesting details that could end up with you having a very successful company.

PAUL: And since we were mentioning the Facebook group, let’s continue the discussion there on our startup expression Facebook group. And for those listening, tell us how you validate your ideas using startup idea validation methods.

FLORIN: Yeah, that’s great. And if you make something really interesting, other than the queries, the Facebook groups, the forums, whatever we discuss today, if you have any other super great example, we can totally do an episode about it as well and mention you and mention you as the source of that amazing piece of content.

PAUL: Yeah, that sounds great. And I think that’s all for.

FLORIN: Today, right? Yeah, that’s all for today’s episode.

PAUL: Talk to you on our Facebook group.