In my last posts, I introduced you to the Idea Optimizer, with a series of questions it uses to see whether your idea is a good one to see it through to implementation as a service or product. Here I’ll look at the second exercise of the Idea Optimizer, which addresses whether your idea will be economically viable if brought to the market.
Answer all of the questions below:
Income
- Who will buy the resulting products/services of this idea?
- How will they purchase the products/services?
- How quickly will income be created?
- What additional markets might this idea be brought to, e.g. educational spin-offs?
- What additional products might come from this idea (e.g., a book)?
- Could you enter complementary or existing marketplaces, or sell your product to competitors?
- Can other people or systems sell this product/service for you?
Expenses
- What aspects of this idea require your time?
- Does the idea require employees, especially new hires?
- What pieces of this idea require outsourced help?
- Will this require renting or buying physical space?
- Do you have any existing shared revenue agreements that must be paid from profits of this idea?
- What will your marketing and production expenses be?
- What are the idea’s opportunity costs? For example: what else could you be doing instead? Are these alternatives more profitable?
Production
- What actions are being taken to implement this idea?
- Who is taking these actions?
- How is the action being taken?
- When will actions begin?
- When will actions be complete?
- How will the status, or “conditions of satisfaction” for these actions be reported to the responsible party?
- Do you have a method of transacting the business of this idea with customers? How will you receive money, and who is accountable (and by when) to receive this money?
Even if an idea is well-defined and promises to create a lucrative business when implemented in the marketplace, pursuing the idea further may be unwise if it does not engage your purpose.
I explore this in my next post. In the meantime, what are your thoughts on the profitability of your idea? Have you considered every aspect of it, if it were to be brought to market? Thank you for sharing.
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