2h validation | TEMPLATE
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Instructions
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Duplicate this page
- Change the title to format "2h validation | [idea keywords/short description] ([date])"
- Fill A. to D.
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Then, think through, comment, and score 1.-6. (Walling's 5PM)
Place the score at the end of the section heading:
🚫🚫🚫🚫 (deal breaker)
⭐🚫🚫🚫 (danger)
⭐⭐🚫🚫 (not optimal, but manageable)
⭐⭐⭐🚫 (good, but not perfect)
⭐⭐⭐⭐ (excellent)
- Write the summary.
Notes
A. to C. are for general research on the subject.
1.-6. are partly based on the results of A. to C.
A. Idea description
- …
B. Potential search keywords, difficulties, and traffic
Use, e.g., Google Keyword Planner, Ahrefs, or SEMrush to find potential keywords and their traffic and difficulty.
| keyword | traffic | difficulty |
|---|---|---|
C. Potential marketing channels. How to reach potential customers?
- …
D. Competitors, existing solutions
- …
1. Problem
| Not very important | Important | |
|---|---|---|
| Aspirin | E.g., a file renaming utility (not a very important problem, but still a problem that is a pain to be solved now. Someone might need this to get their job done, but this is just a minor part of it and there are alternatives) |
best ideas E.g., Zoom (Remote communication is a significant problem that many users need a solution for to get their jobs done.) |
| Vitamin |
worst ideas E.g., Desktop wallpaper organizer (cosmetic, not needed to get a real job done) |
E.g., professional development course (important topic, but this is likely not a fix for a short-term acute problem, but an ambiguous investment into the future.) |
- Is it important and an aspirin?
- Is this a real problem?
- Did you come up with a solution or a problem first? "Don't tell me what your idea is. Tell me what problem it solves."
2. Purchaser
- Does this market adopt new technology?
- Do they have the willingness or ability to pay? a.k.a. price sensitivity.
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Sophistication
- B2C - consumer
- B2A - "aspirational," such as photographers or bloggers
- B2B - business
- B2E - enterprise (long sales cycles, fewer deals, large deals)
Generally, avoid B2C (and B2A). Go for B2B.
3. Pricing model
- Subscription or not?
- ARPA Estimate
- Monthly, annual, share of revenue, etc.
4. Market
- Size - Total Reachable Market
- Ease of reaching customers (are they online?)
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Is the market early or mature? Growing, flat, or declining?
- What part of the market is actively searching for a new solution? Can we address mainly the newcomers (needs a growing market)? Are the users of an existing solution willing to switch (a smaller and flat market could be fine)?
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Competition (How much? Big companies or other startups?)
- Remember that competitors could be a good sign. However, if the space is crowded and there are established, well-marketed products that the users like, that's a bad sign.
5. Product-founder fit
- What about your background and access to this market makes you think you are the right person to build this?
- If this idea is highly technical, do you have the tech chops?
- If this idea is a crowded space, do you have marketing chops?
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Founder's unique advantage
- Audience
- Network
- Do you love this problem?
6. Pain to validate
- How easy would the next validation steps be?
- Time to market/MVP
- Pain of building
Summary
- Overall score based on the individual scores. This is not just an average. Some subjective weighting is possible.
- What are the biggest unknowns and uncertainties? What would need to be validated next (concretely)?
- If the idea works, what would be the biggest cons of the business?
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EV (Expected value, or, ICE score = Impact *
Confidence * Ease)
- Likelihood of Success – A rough probability estimate of the idea working out.
- Potential Return – The financial upside if the idea succeeds.
- Effort or Cost to Execute – The resources (money, time) needed to make it happen.