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In 2010, journalist and writer Steven Johnson wrote âWhere Good Ideas Come Fromâ. His conclusion to this hypothesis? In brief: good ideas come from the real world, from conversations, from debates, from disagreements. Not from science labs or research facilities. And despite popular culture, not from geniuses sat in garages, having lightbulb moments.
Over the past several years, weâve approved close to 100 concepts in our Venture Studio; in terms of concepts, weâve most likely generated 5x that. In doing so, weâve come up with more effective ways for generating, testing, and validating ideas at rates far exceeding that of your average entrepreneur.Â
If youâre looking for ideas for your next business venture, then look no furtherâweâre pulling back the curtain and sharing five methods for generating venture concepts.
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đĄFive methods for generating venture concepts
By Sam Rueesch, Venture Designer at Founders FactoryÂ
1. Choose boring spaces
Weâve seen it with generative AI, and before that, web3 and crypto. Itâs very easy to get caught up in hype, and start building in an area where everyone else is building. The problem with this is that very reasonâeveryone else is building there, so competition is much higher and, unless you time it right, failure is much more likely.Â
Instead, choose boring spacesâareas that may not be glamorous or âhypedâ but answer real problems with scalable solutions. Think infrastructure layers or deep tech, which may be much less known but the demand is no less real. Â
2. Identify areas undergoing change
Change may come in different formsâreal world physical changes (climate change), regulatory or policy change (legalisation of marijuana), or a technological change (progress in AI). But change almost always means opportunity.Â
Developing ideas in spaces where macro factors will boost your growth can be highly advantageous. Again, this comes down to timing (and youâre at risk of getting pulled into a hype wave), but time it well and you may strike gold.Â
3. Surround yourself with information
Many people build in areas where they have experience or deeper expertise: this gives you a big head start. If you arenât already immersed in a particular field, then youâve got a big task to surround yourself with information and learn as much as possible.Â
Read articles on that topic, subscribe to newsletters, follow interesting people on Reddit and twitter, watch videos and read podcasts. Even more, set up meetings with experts in particular fields, speak with potential customers (AKA âpower usersâ), discover their pain points and where opportunities may lie.Â
4. Keep a log of everything
As youâre immersing yourself in everything, be sure to keep everything you are exploring written down. Any concept you come up with, keep a log of it: even better, categorise them so you can filter them by problem, solution, opportunity size, and difficulty to build. Rank them in terms of areas to prioritise and ideas that excite you most.Â
5. Share your thinking
Finally, donât be too guarded over your secrets. Ideas in themselves are pretty much worthless, so donât be afraid to share them with others. This should be part of your verification processâspeak to people in your network, post initial concepts on blogs or on Twitter and ask for feedback.Â
Listen to everyoneâbut be selective over which advice you choose to take. Building a successful business is about knowing when to be humble and when to be stubborn, and this starts at the idea stage.Â
Read Samâs full methodology for generating venture conceptsÂ
đŚ Tweet of the Month
 đŠ Top newsletters to subscribe to
Not Boringâdeep (very deep) dives into macro trends across tech by investor Packy McCormick. Particular focuses on Web3 and AI but themes that stretch far beyond any sector
Digital Nativeâweekly newsletter on âhow technology shapes humanityâ by Rex Woodbury, partner at Index Ventures.Â
PreSeed Nowâformer TechCrunch writer Martin Bryant spotlights a pre-seed startup each week, interviewing their founder and sharing his thoughts on why heâs excited about it
Investing in AIâfortnightly digest of the AI sector, including market trends and their impact on the wider business landscape
Business Brainstormsâas the name would suggesting, a newsletter brainstorming venture ideas in particularly topical spaces Â
First 1000âgrowth-themed newsletter sharing stories behind the worldâs most successful startups and how they grew to their first 1000 users
See you next month đ
Interested in reading more of the same insights? Check out the Founders Factory blog, and previous newsletters.
This newsletter's title got my eye as we're developing a feature called "Hatch." It generates new ideas and articles by finding common things in a few articles.
https://glasp.co/hatch/index.html