How to test the buyers intent for your business idea for less than $100

**benhebert** · Jan 25th, 2013, 08:23 AM

The classic entrepreneurial mistake is building a product that you think serves a market need without ever doing any testing, pre-selling or the market research necessary to be success. We set-up blogs, websites, e-commerce stores, or build products and then it’s like okay now do people even want this? Nothing is more demoralizing than spending your money and time building something only to find out no one wants it.

Failure is an unavoidable part of the learning process for online hustlers, but testing your idea or concept can save you a ton of resources. I use this method to validate whether buyers intent exists for the product, keyword or niche I plan on entering.

Here's the step by step method.

Step 1.) Buy a domain

The domain name should include a keyword related to your niche and be two words. You can get away with three word domains, but I wouldn’t use anything higher than that. You want to stick with top level domains like .com or .net.

Step 2.) Install WordPress / The Launch Effect

The Launch Effect is a free wordpress theme (with a premium option) that allows you to create a beautiful landing page with ease. When you set up your landing page, you want to try a few variations of text that you think may motivate people to make a purchase.

Step 3.) Advertise on Google & Facebook

Pay per click advertising is a solid way to drive targeted traffic to your website, to test buyers intent. You can setup an account on Google Adwords (introduction & overview) and begin bidding on keywords related to your business.

Step 4.) Make a Decision

After you run this campaign for two weeks or so, you want to compile all of the data and make the decision whether you move forward with your original idea, pivot to something else or scrap it entirely.

For the full post you can check it out on my blog, but if anyone has any specific questions on this method feel free to dm me or leave a comment. Trust me that testing your ideas for niche sites or products this way before actually building them will save tons of time and effort.

**SportsFan438** · Feb 8th, 2013, 10:21 PM

I agree with everything you mentioned in your post, but sometimes its hard to convey an idea on a landing page. A product would be much easier than a service to explain, because you can easily show and describe your product. A service is harder because it takes user action and many times users are skeptical or uninterested in signing up for an idea on a landing page. I think this is where the lean start-up can help speed up the process by figuring out that one dying need you believe consumers want and creating a service solely around that. I think surveys can be most helpful when identifying the strategy to take for a minimum viable product as well.

**Brander** · Feb 9th, 2013, 07:34 AM

Or you could do it for $0 and just find out what they want by talking to them.

**MMatt** · Feb 9th, 2013, 12:44 PM

Do you have experience with this method turning into profitable businesses? If so, how many visits per day and conversions would you say is required to determine that an idea is worth investing more time into?