Write Docs To Talk Yourself Out Of Your Latest Idea: Why Solopreneurs Should Kill Most Of Their Ideas
I write concept docs for new business ideas to talk myself out of the idea. Learn to say no. For clarity, I write in narrative form. No bullets, tables, or different-sized fonts (similar to how we wrote at Amazon). I keep it to no more than two-pages and follow this outline:
- 🌬️ Industry Segment & Tailwinds
- 🎯 Customer Segment
- 😔 Pain Point
- ✨ Differentiated Solution
- 🚫 Assumptions To Invalidate
If it takes more than two hours to write the doc. Problem. If any of the sections feel forced. Problem. This is especially true for the differentiated solution and assumptions to invalidate sections. It is easy to talk yourself into a new idea. I prefer to attack my own ideas. Be dialectic. The addition for solopreneurs is to assess 1) how much capital is needed to break even, 2) if the business can be run with zero employees plus 0-10 contractors, and 3) can someone consistently run this business working 30-50 hours per week without burning out.
Once the doc is done, I flip and evaluate the doc as an investor.
Most ideas aren’t worth chasing. Write them down, throw them in a folder, and move on.
Related Posts
Strategy Docs Aren't Just For Big Companies: Here Is A Simple Framework For Solopreneurs To Document Their Business Strategy — 🏆Winning Aspiration: Why does the business exist? What is the north star (i.e., what is winning ⟵
Don't Build A Micro-SaaS Product First: Here's Why You'll Regret It As A Software Solopreneur — 🕵️♂️ Choose Your People: Figure out who you want to servePick a group that you deeply c ⟶
Prioritize Outcomes Over Activities Free Cash Flow Is the Goal for Seven Figure Solopreneurs — When operating a business of one, you want simple input goals with experiments that you can run in ⟶
