How to pick startup ideas (2015)

Re:How to pick startup ideas (2015) by rpedela on Tuesday November 08, 2016 @02:43PM (#12903318)

I haven't read the book, but from my experience I have found that truly new ideas/products are much harder to explain (I have tried a couple). If someone is already using a competing or similar product then you can say it is like X but here is how we are different/better. If you are the first mover, then you have to explain what X is, why X is useful, and why they should pay for X. Being a first mover is also riskier because there isn't proof that there is a market yet.

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Re:How to pick startup ideas (2015) by cpayne on Tuesday November 08, 2016 @07:04PM (#12905105)

This is why the whole startup space drives me mad!

You can do a whole lot of naval gazing, and then what are you left with?

First movers are hard, because (as you've described) you have to educate the market, and then give a reason to buy.

Think about the marketing effort of Lotus-123 vs Excel.

Or Twitter vs Facebook

Or Dwarf Fortress vs Minecraft

This is why I think Scott Adam's book "How to fail at almost everything and still win big" is brilliant. He suggests focusing on the process (get the process right) and the goal will look after itself

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Re:How to pick startup ideas (2015) by gnicholas on Tuesday November 08, 2016 @05:21PM (#12904487)

yep, this is the "second-mover advantage." It doesn't always outweigh the first-mover advantage (especially where network effects exist), but it can in some cases.

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