Why should you validate your business idea? Well, imagine starting a business without having the faintest idea of whether your business idea is feasible or not. In another instance, it’s like embarking on a journey without determining which route leads to your destination. What are the chances that you won’t get stuck at a dead end or spend time traveling in the wrong direction?

Unvalidated business ideas are one of the many reasons why businesses fail. The other reasons include lack of funding and poor employee or team performance - among others. 

Reasons like funding and performance are relatively easier to sort out. How? An entrepreneur could win a grant, or the heart of an investor and get their business back in full throttle. Also, if there’s a performance issue, the entrepreneur could hire a new set of team members. 

When it comes down to an unrealistic idea, the most effective fix is usually to undertake a complete business pivot. This is both costly and time-consuming. It is also demanding on entrepreneurs and entire business teams because they’d have to brainstorm every detail of their new business idea.

‍Also Read: The 5 Fundamental Steps To Creating a Marketing Plan

What Does it Mean to Validate a Business Idea?

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When you validate a business idea, you’re simply checking to confirm that the idea is viable. Can it work at all? Will your product or service stand a chance in the market? Has anyone else succeeded in a similar business? These are all the questions you need to answer. 

In addition, the process of validating a business idea includes assessing your capacity to run a business based on the idea you have. One reason why this helps is that every founder and entrepreneur have their different intellectual, physical and social capacities. So because one founder was able to turn a particular business idea into a successful business venture doesn’t automatically mean that every founder will be able to do the same thing. 

How Do You Validate Your Business Idea? 

Validating your business idea might sound like a difficult task when you first hear of it. Fortunately, it doesn’t have to be so. I will show you two helpful ways you can easily validate your business idea. These include talking to an expert, talking to your target customers, or running a field test to see how the market responds. Let’s dive into the details.

1. Interview Experts For Their Opinion on Your Business Idea

Experts are called experts because they have an in-depth understanding of their industry or field. Founders can leverage this knowledge and experience when thinking of launching a business. To do so, they would need to contact and schedule interviews with experts. 

Also Read: Achieving Product Market Fit In Your Business

The need to have a well-planned question-and-answer session is because one or two questions will not suffice. As a result, accessing an interview prompts founders to compile all their questions so they don’t leave anything out. They’ll also work on recording the answers they receive as a reference while building their business. Here’s a good resource detailing tips for arranging meetings with entrepreneurs, and some thoughtful questions you should ask them. 

2. Interview Potential Customers or Investors

Investors and potential customers are all good resources for founders. They engage directly with products and services and so they know a lot and have seen many businesses come up and grow big or fail tremendously. Asking these set of people what they think of your business idea could reveal flaws or inefficiencies which you may have missed. 

3. Launch and Test Your Idea

Whether you can hold interviews with experts and customers or not, you will have to test your business idea as a way of validating it. There are two ways to go about this. 

1. Build a Prototype or MVP:

The first is by developing a prototype or mini version of your product or service. Such a prototype is usually referred to as a minimum viable product (MVP). You should see our article on how to create a successful MVP. 

1. Create a Landing Page for Your Prototype Idea or MVP:

Once your prototype service or product is up and running, the next thing you need to do is to create a landing page for it. A landing page serves as an introductory web page. It is similar to a counter or reception area in buildings because it welcomes customers, responds to their inquiries about a product or service, and guides them around. 

Having a landing page will easily allow you to track what customers do when their search for a product or service brings them to your online doorstep.

What Tools Do You Need to Validate Your Business Idea?

Online platforms are increasingly becoming useful and accessible. Numerous platforms offer a wide range of tools and services which founders could employ in validating their business ideas. Some of these tools include;

• Quora: A platform that simply allows users to ask or answer questions. The platform is particularly useful for founders who need advice on one issue or the other, or directions on starting or managing a business. 

• Typeform: Interviewing an expert or a customer might require you to use a questionnaire. Typeform is one service you should consider for this. It offers the tools for building several different forms of surveys.    

• Google Trends: If you have an eye for trends, then this is one platform you should put to use. It is a product from Google that allows users to see how popular a search query is. This unfiltered data will enable potential business owners to understand how much people search for services or products similar to what you intend to offer. 

Here is a complete list of the top 10 tools that you can use to validate your business idea. 

Also Read: The Complete Marketing Plan Outline for Your Business

Conclusion

Some business owners do not take time to validate their business ideas and this is similar to building a castle in the air. If you want to succeed in your business, you should be sure that you have a solid business idea. In this article, we have outlined two ways in which you can validate your business idea and also provided a list of tools to help you in doing so. Remember, the success or failure of your business all depends on how solid the business idea is. A good marketing strategy and millions of dollars in investment won’t take a business very far if the idea is not viable.

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