

One man and a $9 idea validation. - aditsgupta
https://medium.com/entrepreneurs-startups/9318bb61dad1

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onion2k
Building a single page website, linking it to a mailing list and posting about
how you're 'hacking a startup for $9' on Medium and HN is not idea validation.
You could get 10,000,000 people signing up and that wouldn't tell you
_anything_ about whether or not it'll be a successful business … because
you're asking the wrong people.

The only people who count in a mailing list or a beta are the people who'd
eventually buy your product idea. Marketing it to the startup industry, e.g.
people who'd be interested in it because it's a $9 startup rather than people
who have adventures and want a Flipboard clone for their pastime, then you're
marketing it to people who are interested in it _for the wrong reasons_. Those
people won't become customers. It doesn't matter how many there are on your
list. All you've done is fool yourself into believing you're working on
something that has a market without actually knowing whether or not that's
true. You have _not_ validated your idea. You've only tapped an easy group of
people who sign up to things because they're interested in signing up to
things; not because they're interested in your product specifically.

Building a mailing list or a group of beta users using a 'startup list' like
Betali.st is nothing more than vanity. You _must_ take your product to the
market who'll buy it to know if it will be a success.

Build a mailing list of 1,000 people from marketing on extreme sports and
adventure holiday websites, and then you'll have validated something.

(Obvious caveat: This isn't true if your product is actually for startups.)

