market-research, target-marketGiven that I have an initial concept or problem I’d like to solve, before I make the dive to having a prototype of my product design and commit to a business model, I want to do a complete competitive analysis of indirect/ direct competition as well as the value I can bring.
In other words, I’d like to use a data driven approach to form my business with a statistically high confidence that I’m heading in the right direction. I would normally feel that this market research, though expensive and time consuming, should be standard and done before asking for funding. However we know that most startups, even with funding go under.
Is it often that if market research is done correctly, the product will still fail? What are the next common reasons for the product to fail and how else can I remove uncertainty that there’s a need for my business? What are market research blunders?
Market research done correctly will always be based on assumptions and some of those assumptions will inevitably be wrong. Some wrong assumptions will tank your company and some will not.
You can try to reduce your assumptions and do research to justify your assumptions but they will always be there.
If you try to eliminate all assumptions, it will take you an excessive amount of time, and by then the market may have changed or you will just exhaust yourself and give up!
Do your best and try to justify your assumptions, but at some point you just have to go for it.
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