Find a Real Problem

The one thing

A company is just a solution to a problem someone will pay to fix. So find the problem first.

Start here

New founders fall in love with a product. A clever app, a nice name, a thing they want to build. Then they go looking for someone who needs it. That is backwards, and it is why so many first ideas go nowhere.

Fall in love with a problem instead. The best problems are the ones close to you. Something that annoys you every week. Something your family runs into. Something you watched a small business near you struggle with. You do not need to look far. Wherever you live, there are small businesses, students, and families with problems no big company bothers to solve.

What to do

• Carry a notes app for two weeks and write down every problem you notice. Yours, your family's, your neighbour's, a shop owner's. Do not judge them yet. Just collect.
• After two weeks, look at the list and ask one question of each: would someone pay to make this go away?
• Circle the ones that get a clear yes. Cross out the ones you only wish were problems.

The fear, named

The fear is that your problem is too small, or too boring, or that someone must have solved it already. Small and boring is good. Small and boring means it is real and unglamorous enough that no big company is fighting you for it. A problem you can describe to a stranger, who then nods and says "yes, that is annoying," is worth more than a big exciting idea nobody actually feels.

Your move this week

Start the list today. By the end of the week, have at least ten real problems written down, and for one of them, the name of a person who has it.

You are ready when

You can point at one specific problem, held by one real person you could name, that someone would pay to make go away.