Bunch of Ideas But Don't Know How To Realize Them

[zhack]

Hey everyone!

First of all, I wanna say that this forum is such a relief for people like me (and of course, the TMF book) and I'm grateful to read a lot of good stuff and I shall try to contribute as much as I can. I also want to ask something, and I hope I won't be breaking any of the rules (I read them a couple of times before posting this). I am aware this isn't a crowd sourcing site, I just thought maybe anyone is willing to help with suggestions as much as I am willing to help others, too.

I've came across several ideas (both offline and online products) over the years of my career but most of the responses I get is,

1. see if you yourself would use your own product, find out what the market needs
2. find an angel investor (obviously, I cannot handle development or production expenses)
3. quit your job, focus on your project and make it to the market

However, I really don't have a good way to test my ideas on my own unless the product and market is already there. I tried asking friends but most of them are not good fit for the product (at least from where I am). For example, I have an idea about a transparent LED panel for trucks rear side that would show Clear Signs of what a truck is doing remote controlled by the driver using pre-configured messages like ("Curving Left", "Go Take Ahead","I'm at 100mph", etc.) but most of my friends or people in my contacts don't have trucks or buses, and would usually just say that's a great idea, help reduce accidents! I have dozens of ideas but untestable or researchable in my case. (I tried quirky.com/kickstarter.com by the way but to no avail, perhaps they can't work with someone outside the U.S.)

Secondly, angel investors need to have to some proof before taking on supporting a project, which goes back to no. 1 and no. 3.

Finally, I can't quit my job because I'm clinging to it, and currently I don't have any savings to pay for the bills. I've had a stint last year (2016) at a 50/50 partnership with some local businessman, but unfortunately I got ripped off when income started pouring in. (it was a local ISP business and now it averages about $50,000 a month) but it was okay with me because my goal there anyway was to help the local community enjoy the internet.

I hope someone can point me to the right direction. Because I've asked around in my circle and it's a very common situation especially among developers who could come up with great ideas anytime, but are afraid to take chances.

 

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[David Young]

Prototyping is relativity straightforward these days. You only really need a little, money a PC and time. Sketchup up is great piece of software for designing physical products. You can also download the objects as an .stl file. This means you can then get them 3d printed through a resource such as 3D Hub. The world of electronics and circuits can appear quite daunting. However, there are plenty of resources available on-line that would help with an LED based project (Raspberry Pi, Adruino etc). You could of course sub contract the work through a site such as upwork or freelance. Though I would recommend you have a go yourself so that you understand the technology underpinning the product. Once you have the basics of a prototype you can then look at how much funding you would need to finish the development work, how you will validate the product etc.

 

[Raza-Associates]

Well if you have business plan i suggest you to share your idea with powerful entrepreneur societies and get funding from them, If you are not sure to share your ideas with strangers i suggest you to take some time do some savings then start a small setup, Get it register from copyright department instantly and then share your ideas with investors to expand your business.

 

[zhack]

Prototyping is relativity straightforward these days. You only really need a little, money a PC and time. Sketchup up is great piece of software for designing physical products.

Thanks for the advice. I appreciate it.

I finally thought of a way to do prototyping without having to spend much of my time (for that particular example I gave).

The world of electronics and circuits can appear quite daunting.

As a computer engineer, I can do most of the hardwork myself but what's truly daunting to me is the validation of this product into the tech market whether it would sell or not.

You could of course sub contract the work through a site such as upwork or freelance.

For the above example, I gave it away as a college student's thesis project so that they can work on the prototyping and they can consult with me anytime they need. It's a give and take situation. For my online ideas, i don't think I can afford to spend money on outsourcing. I will just have to find time (maybe weekends?) to come up with a simple website SaaS product to start with and try to make the "FIRST SALE" as @MJ DeMarco would put it. If I cannot make it to its first sale, I'd have to learn from it then, just have to take the risk to spend hours on an idea.

Though I would recommend you have a go yourself so that you understand the technology underpinning the product. Once you have the basics of a prototype you can then look at how much funding you would need to finish the development work, how you will validate the product etc.

For offline products: If I can have the prototype together with estimated startup cost then, any suggestions on how to initially approach angel investors?

For online products: Let's say I have the website ready with its minimum features, (say it's a bidding website for high-end car rentals like ferrari, porsche, bugatti, etc.) but no one knows about my site or no one trusts it unless we get to a point that someone has to spend on marketing to get both
A.The car owners and B. The car renters to join and populate the website. The only way is to do organic marketing but that entails a lot of work which will call for quitting my job.


UPDATE: i just had an AHA! moment here from one of the posts. It was a conversation between one who was looking for angel investors apparently thinking this forum is full of one. Then the answer came back, "Have you tried your friends, relatives, neighbors?"

This is so true. If you can't convince the people around you and who knows you, how the hell would you expect strangers to spend for your ideas? That simple answer makes a lot of sense. So I'm going this path, hoping to raise enough to start again and help people with my ideas along the way.

 

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[furiousJ]

see if you yourself would use your own product, find out what the market needs

However, I really don't have a good way to test my ideas on my own unless the product and market is already there.

There is a huge Market in the industrial safety industry. I could see your product maybe being adopted by mining operations or warehouse operations where safety is a main priority. I see it being built into the back of a forklift . on a city bus i would imagine it would be useful as an advertising tool.

Many would steer you away from angel investors I have no experience there . You may wish to read "the lean startup"
you can also go through this video playlist

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQ-9qWRBaCA

 

[David Young]

At this stage make sure that you are 100% comfortable with the product concept and associated business plan; try and be as critical as you can and review it from lots of different angles. If you are still confident that you have a good product then develop an idea of how much money you need to (1) optimise a working prototype and (2) take the product to market. These days you do not need to take the product from concept to market in one go. A typical route is to get funding to develop the prototype, marketing, business plan etc and then launch a crowdfunding campaign. In this instance you only need to convince an early stage investors (family friends etc) of the value of the product - not the wider market- they do not require the same level of validation. Validation comes from the Crowdfunding campaign. Angel investors and accelerators are always looking for good ideals to back so don't be shy about contacting them. I have spoken to a few over the last few months and it was clear that, although they will be critical, they desperately don't want to be the guys who turn down the next big thing so they will listen.

 

[Paul Thomas]

As a computer engineer, I can do most of the hardwork myself but what's truly daunting to me is the validation of this product into the tech market whether it would sell or not.

In this case

1. Create working prototype
2. Take videos of it in use + photos portraying main benefits
3. Write sales page / video sales page
4. Have a call to action button to buy now on #3's page
5. Figure out your target customer + how to target them on Facebook
6. Run advertisements to said #3's sales page from #5 target audience
7. Gauge demand based on how many people buy your product
8. Have buy button actually buy or say out of stock (refund if the primary)

Then you know if its worth pursuing. You can always optimize the cost it takes you to acquire a customer if people are buying it.

 

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[zhack]

There is a huge Market in the industrial safety industry. I could see your product maybe being adopted by mining operations or warehouse operations where safety is a main priority. I see it being built into the back of a forklift . on a city bus i would imagine it would be useful as an advertising tool.

Many would steer you away from angel investors I have no experience there . You may wish to read "the lean startup"
you can also go through this video playlist

Thanks! I watched the video, very informative.

I'm not really talking about just one single idea, I have several ideas that could bring good benefit and sometimes I care less whether I or somebody else gets to come up with a product first, 'cause it's not always about the money. An example would be one of the ideas is a slide pump you can place in busy highways where every car that passes by it, moves the slide and pumps a generator thereby creating small electricity, then aggregating the electricity it generates, it makes renewable electricity as opposed to the solar roads where you have to cover entire stretches to get enough electricity. However, these things just stay with me as ideas. Anyway, I'm currently focusing now on going my own path towards the fastlane so that when the time comes I need to finance an idea, I can do it by myself. I think I just came up with an idea that may have the Control, Entry, Need, Time and Scale factors. I just need to take action, a lot of the things I read through this forum really pushes me to start doing something. Thanks to everyone that has contributed in this forum. The threads in this forum are The Millionaire Fastlane book by MJ what people should be reading, and start doing something that can help a lot of people and impact millions instead of getting overloaded with information about entrepreneurship and has forgotten the core of it all, which is helping others.

Angel investors and accelerators are always looking for good ideals to back so don't be shy about contacting them. I have spoken to a few over the last few months and it was clear that, although they will be critical, they desperately don't want to be the guys who turn down the next big thing so they will listen.

Thanks. I'll keep this in mind. Probably soon I have something to show them, I just need to start creating that "something".


@Paul Thomas
Wow, very concise and helpful. I copied them on my phone for easy access. Thank you!

EDITED:
Just gave credit to the book. I'm not sure if there's a rule not to talk about the contents of the Millionaire Fastlane book. @MJ DeMarco