ideaI have a few ideas for startups that I would like feedback on. Today I found a site called IdeaSquares - it had a nice design, but the comment were all like, “Wow, nice idea”, “Nice app”, ect. There was no actual feedback occurring. Where can I go for feedback on startup ideas?
It’s super hard getting feedback. Why? Because most of us, most of the time, crave validation and encouragement. So giving others vague positivity seems like the right thing to do.
What’s important when you’re playing with a startup idea is to hunt down the weaknesses.
So first you need to find the parts you’re most concerned about. Those are often (a) places you’re guessing about a market you know something about, but not as an insider; (b) areas where your domain expertise tells you you’re making risky assumptions; (c) parts of your value proposition that you are modelled on big, successful companies, where you seem to need scale before you can deliver value.
Then take these narrow points to experienced people not for reassurance, but for their clear-eyed judgements.
The main place to get relevant, meaningful and qualitative feedback is to ask potential customers in the problem area the product or service is trying to solve. People who experience the problem on a daily basis and have a vested interest in a solution will be your best source of critical feedback. e.g. If it’s a health app, go talk to health professionals. If it’s an app for X go talk to the people who need or use those types of apps. Go talk to them again when you have a mock-up or prototype.
Build a social network of people in the space you’re looking to enter and ask selected people what they think of the idea.
If you have a graphical mock-up and a description of the idea post it on a site like http://launchsky.com/ to get detailed comments.
If your social network is distributed around the world and you can’t physically show them, use a tool like http://www.invisionapp.com/ to do collaborative presentations of mock-ups as if they are the real thing and collate typed comments.
Hm.. what if we change the order of your questions and before asking “Where can I go for feedback…” ask “Who should I ask?” & “How?”.
WHO To be specific here, you are creating a new startup/product for certain target group and you should find representatives of this group first, rather than ask random people. In order to discover your product assumptions, you can try to fill in e.g. a Product Vision Board - http://www.romanpichler.com/blog/tips-for-writing-compelling-product-vision/. I
HOW First of all, I would recommend to meet those people in their natural surrounding and ideally in a similar context as they are going use your product. For example: in their office, while commuting, etc. Second of all, if this is possible show them something that looks like your product and observe their interactions. Build a facade - a mockup, slides, prototype etc.
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