

Has anyone done market research for their startup? - Skeletor

I'm working on a web startup in the medical technology field.  I'm taking a 10 week business entrepreneur course and I've started doing old school market research at the business library at the advice of a potential investor.<p>I'm actually finding the process really useful, but as a long time software developer a part of me is urging myself to stop the research and finish coding the prototype of my site.  Has anyone else struggled with this balance of work when building their prototype and business plan?
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fnazeeri
The cheapest, fastest product ever built is the one never made.

Good market research will help you identify the customer you're aiming to help
and their specific problem. In addition to "academic" market research,
consider doing "field work" where you talk to, interview and "shadow" actual
potential users. All this work will definitely make for a better product that
if you just start coding.

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bootload
_"... Has anyone else struggled with this balance of work when building their
prototype and business plan? ... The cheapest, fastest product ever built is
the one never made ..."_

At the same time over-analysis could stop you building a product at all. Would
a bit of research, then release a version quickly getting feedback from users
work?

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jamongkad
I think your approach would be the optimum balance. Build something rather
quickly that fits your problem domain. You don't have to build something
perfect, just something that is usable and is relevant to the problem your
attacking (use common sense).

Release something to your target audience and see what they think of it. Then
you can iterate from there mixing in your academic market research and your
real life market research.

Oh before I forget, build something that you yourself will definitely use. And
don't forget to have fun in the process!

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tstegart
I usually find it very helpful, but at the same time I'm not a developer, so I
can afford to spend the time really thinking about my ideas. For me, market
research usually identifies opportunities I have missed and obstacles I should
take into account. And it helps adjust expectations. A lot of people you'd
think would say yes end up saying no.

I think many people miss the fact that a lot of this "business stuff" was done
in the past because it normally took a lot more capital to start a business
before the internet. You really had to think through your ideas before you put
thousands of dollars on the line. Now all you need to take care of is a domain
name and $100/month in hosting fees. It just doesn't pay to spend so much time
when the risk is so low.

So ask yourself, would a prototype cost you anything? Can you start getting
feedback and sign up potential customers with just a site and no huge cash
outlay? If you can, then do it. If you need money to really get the business
off the ground, then do your research, because its important, and likely
required for investment.

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trapper
When a couple of months work can be saved by doing a few phone calls or some
"fake selling", prototypes are by far the worst way of doing things.
Understanding whether your customers will pay is critical for business
success, and can often be done a priori

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unalone
I don't know if I'll be downvoted for this, but - no. When I design, I build
it for one person and one person alone - myself. I add the features that I
want to have access to. I make the layout one that I find attractive and
usable. I consider myself to be my product's first user. While I can see
market research helping out a lot, I've always felt that the smartest thing to
do is to make it for yourself and take feedback only after you're entirely
satisfied with it.

It's a process that I think helps a lot if you're working with a really
original concept. The user doesn't always know best. If you're doing it right,
chances are you know exactly what you want, and that is something that you
ought to follow first and foremost.

When I first conceptualized my site, I took the idea and told writers (the
target audience) all about it. Most of the time, they couldn't visualize it
whatsoever. When I asked them what DIDN'T work in sites today, they would say
either that they had no clue, that there WAS no good solution, or that things
were satisfactory as they were.

Last month, I demoed the concept HTML page to those same people for the first
time, and you could absolutely feel the minds shifting. People abruptly
understood the concept behind the page. The design of the page worked
perfectly for them as it had been originally conceived.

I understand doing market research if you're going out and just stumbling upon
an idea, looking for something that will work. But if you've got an idea,
something that's never been done, then you take it and you push it and you
wait until after it's done to see how people react to it. The result is a much
more honest and effective site that way.

I'm sure other people disagree with me, so feel free to debate this point back
at me.

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tstegart
I don't think that's a bad way of going about it, just that it might not
always be applicable. Some people go into business because they like business
and see an opportunity, even though they may never use the product themselves.
So they can't design it for themselves, because they wouldn't use it, and
wouldn't know how it is used, or the best way to use it (such as a medical
device company or something along those lines). So someone who has a great
idea but is not a likely customer will have a lot to gain by going out and
asking what real customers want and expect and what they would pay.

~~~
unalone
Okay! That actually makes a lot of sense; I'd never thought of it that way.
Thanks for the response!

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manishsm
Yes ofcourse! The struggle is ongoing; especially when you have a team of
software developers. We do continuous market research by regular
interviews/polls, keeping up with news in the interest area, talking to people
(or forums) dedicated to your target area and finally looking at current
companies in the focus area. We have one engineer give 30-40% time on market
research and other's keep tab on specific focus areas.

Keep coding on the side, work on the re-usable components (in case you change
the focus area or the main value add). Example, infrastructure (databases,
user management etc), maybe getting your garage ready for primetime. Even if
you discover the idea you have would not work in the market next idea can have
a quick ride on this infrastructure.

And finally, experimenting is the best way to find out. If you are thinking
revolutionary then any type of market research will not be conclusive. If the
idea is evolutionary then you have lots to gain from existing market research
(get membership of some marketing companies) and you own!

Best of Luck ~M

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vecter
Tons and tons of market research. We have folders of interviews with potential
members of the target market, and lots of other documents about market size
and competitors.

To address your latter point, I'm a developer myself an I'm working with two
other guys. One is non-technical and the other is technical but more geared
toward the CEO role. Frankly, I'm very passionate about the whole project, but
especially the technology and seeing it work. It's nice that I can offload a
lot of the market research to these two other guys and focus on coding,
although I do spend a lot of time brainstorming with them also.

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il
I think it's crucial for a startup to have at least one person dedicated
exclusively to marketing-unless you're exceptional, only having developers
won't cut it.

Despite the fact that we're "Web 2.0"/new economy, you still face the same
marketing challenges, and you absolutely must worry about market segmentation,
sensitivity analysis, market channels, usability testing, etc etc.

It seems that only in the startup space we're so divorced from the realities
of marketing a product or service because our vision is clouded by mirages of
exponential viral growth.

If someone at Kraft or Chevrolet or Microsoft asked "Should we do market
research?" they would be laughed at- of COURSE you should do market research,
and yet many startups stuck in the false if-you-build-it-they-will-come
mentality seem to think they could get by without even the most basic market
analysis.

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PStamatiou
not exactly what you asked for, but these proved helpful for me when I was
doing market research for Skribit

[http://www.va-
interactive.com/inbusiness/editorial/sales/ibt...](http://www.va-
interactive.com/inbusiness/editorial/sales/ibt/market_analysis.html)
[http://va-interactive.com/inbusiness/editorial/sales/ibt/tar...](http://va-
interactive.com/inbusiness/editorial/sales/ibt/target_market.html)
[http://sbinfocanada.about.com/cs/marketing/a/marketresearch_...](http://sbinfocanada.about.com/cs/marketing/a/marketresearch_2.htm)

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jakewolf
mechanical turk is a great way to get feedback or have surveys taken quickly
and very cheaply. mturk.com

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floozyspeak
Right now you can't afford to spend money and be wrong. Yet at the same time
you need to make sure that whatever spend goes a long way. Use your money
well, ask clear questions, and get real clear good human actionable toward ROI
answers- and then don't stop there. Take that data, those customers, those
people that want X out of your product and use them as part of your marketing
and PR materials. It makes for a good story on the how and why you need to be
around.

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truebosko
It's important to get some research done. I'm not on the same scale of your
project but I noticed my "market" was in dire need of something stable and
easy to use. There was already existing ones but they lacked true usefulness
and caged most users in

Without looking around and seeing what options are out there and what really
frustrates users (In my case, browsing forums for that info.) then I would
have never known how to go about building my app.

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donniefitz2
I'm a developer and I too feel a certain intensity to just get coding. If you
don't look and see what's out there in the way of your market, you might just
be pissing in the wind. Research first, code later.

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donna
constantly -- and it's crazy making.

