Ask HN Surely all the good niches aren't taken? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN Surely all the good niches aren't taken?

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I'm trying to think of an niche/idea. I want to build a lifestyle business, and I'm really struggling to come up with a niche that doesn't already have someone playing it from every angle.

I've read PG's ideas [1] and Start Small, Stay Small [2] and I laughed my way through patio11's 'Hello Ladies' [3] ... BUT I'm still really struggling to find a niche that looks a) worthwhile b) addressable and c) not already saturated.

Any thoughts appreciated.

[1] http://paulgraham.com/ideas.html

[2] http://www.startupbook.net/

[3] http://akshat.posterous.com/patio11-says-hello-ladies

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You're looking for a solution, not a problem. I know that sounds like a cliche, but it's exactly what you're doing. And chances are, your solution won't have a problem. Or mostly likely, the problem will be so small and inconsequential that a viable market for a new unfunded business doesn't exist.

We founders overestimate the size of new/niche markets by orders of magnitude. We also forget that it's perfectly acceptable to enter existing markets.

You need to solve a serious problem that's a high priority for lots of people. It does not need to be new. In fact, unless you are very technical, your solution won't be new. Don't ask people if they'd use your product. Ask what problems they have. If they name your problem, Bingo.

Let's say my product is a an automatic nail clipper. It cuts nails perfectly in 1/10 the time. I ask you, "What's troubling you these days?" If you say, "It takes me too goddamn long to clip my nails", well, I'm onto something. So ask yourself, "What's up?"

For me, I was troubled finding medium term accommodation in a new city (Berlin). It really troubled me. I knew about AirBnB, but only went to it as a last resort. I messaged people asking what price they'd do for medium term. Worked great. Made me think there should be something dedicated to monthly rentals. I have this problem every 3 months when I move to a new city. It's such a pain in the ass that it's the only thing that makes me want to go back home.

Let's take AirBnB. Not new. Not even remotely new. Big market? Of course. Simple? Absolutely! Niche? I guess; they started in a smaller area.

Anyway, solve a problem you have. It's not easy to solve someone else's problems because, apart from having no industry experience, you don't even have personal experience.

OP here; thank you. I think what you say is spot on.

> You're looking for a solution, not a problem. I know that sounds like a cliche, but it's exactly what you're doing.

Yep, I think you're right. How did you get that from what little I wrote?

> And chances are, your solution won't have a problem.

Yep, I've been there before.

> You need to solve a serious problem that's a high priority for lots of people. It does not need to be new. In fact, unless you are very technical, your solution won't be new.

I am very technical, but that's not necessarily helpful as the technologist in me loves creating solutions! (Without necessarily addressing a problem felt by lots of people).

> Anyway, solve a problem you have. It's not easy to solve someone else's problems because, apart from having no industry experience, you don't even have personal experience.

Yes. This seems to be the common thread here. I'm sure it's staring me in the face.

I took a course with a professor who is an entrepreneur. Some tidbits of what he said:

If you have an idea stop right now. Find a problem. Ask pointed questions, but if you get too specific you'll only cheat yourself. Example (to steal someone else's) is the dog nail clippers. If you ask "What troubling you these days?" they can say anything from the market to the weather. If you say "What's troubling you about dog maintenance?" you can probably end up with nail clippers. If you ask "What's troubling you with cutting your dog's nails?" you've shot yourself in the foot.

As far as criteria for startup goes it went something like this

1) Billion+ dollar market. 1% of a billion is still a million.

2) Growing at 5% a year. Even if you do nothing your business is growing.

3) Money is spent on it already. No one spends money on it? You're either a genius or no one cares. For instance, deodorant. Somehow some people convinced us all that we need to smell good, so we need deodorant. So while you could make the next deodorant odds are you're not. As a corollary to this there will be competition.

4) Control your own distribution. For example: Magazines are difficult to sell. It's $$$ upfront to even put your magazine on the rack in a store, and they don't guarantee sales. You don't want this.

5...) Find some criteria that you would be happy with on a personal level. It could be that you reject running a business a certain way ("It has to be moral in this way") or something like that. Don't limit yourself to one technology or revenue stream.

Now go through your list of problems and find something that matches all these criteria. Pick something that matches.

Are their multiple matches? Pick whichever you feel strongest about.

2 or more tied? Pick one at random. You made the criteria because anything that matched it would be something that you would be happy doing and would be a good business. So just pick something and go do it.

Disclaimer: Even if you do all this, you could still fail, but you've just reduced the odds compared to every guy with an idea looking for a problem.

I remember reading a book about writing by Stephen King. He talked about innovating by combining strange ideas. An example he gave was that a book about plumbers would be boring and that science fiction was a crowded competitive market. But, he said a book about "Plumbers in Space" had the makings of a great story.

So, try to combine something you LOVE with something you admire.

Maybe you love cooking, maybe you admire Facebook. How about "Facebook for Cooks?"

or, "Wordpress for Restaurants", "Twitter for Travelers", "Google for Mechanics"

Once you have the area you love, you can pick and choose ideas from the leaders in the tech space and bring those that make sense into your niche. Make them easier to use for your audience, refine them, make them your own.

That's kind of what I do at FASO with art as the thing I love. BTW, someone else on this thread described us as niche photo sharing for artists - that's actually not what we do. We're more like "Wordpress for Artists", except that we predate Wordpress so technically Wordpress is like "FASO for Everyone Else". :-)

Last year I emailed 20 of my clients, requesting to chat about something off topic. I interviewed them, gaining insight to their jobs and processes. They talked my ear off. I learned a lot, especially about niche markets to serve them. I now had a handful of people to ask "will you please buy this?"

I could have tried to be a disrupter or social / iPhone something, but that would be time WASTED spinning my wheels and not building something ppl want and getting paid.

I can only recommend what has worked for me.

I think you should look at the niches you are in or your girlfriend's to start with.

Also, it is not because someone is already adressing a specific issue that someone else can't jump in with another solution (unless that competitor already has reached 100% of the market and even then your job would be to convince their customers that your product is better).

You may have dismissed a few of the niches that you are a part of simply because of the "someone has already done it" stigma.

If you are after a lifestyle business, stop thinking like you are building a startup.

Starting a lifestyle business will for sure take you a lot of energy in the coming years. There will be time when you want to give up. In those hard times things are easier if you are doing what you love. I think that choosing a niche is better if you are solving a problem in the area you have a knowledge. That could be your big asset [1]. What are your hobbies? What do you like to do?

Many niches are very saturated. That doesn't mean you should give up. If you have something that your competition didn't solve good (or at all) there is a place for you. Your competency in certain area will help you beat them. Even if you take a small fraction of their pie, probably it should be enough for your lifestyle business.

OTOH, if you are looking for non-saturated market and find it, you can ask yourself is there any money in that market? Is it worthwhile? You can find it is, but do you like that market? Do you know anything about it?

My point here is do what you love and money will come after years of hard work.

[1] http://faso.com/code618/34150/how-my-lifestyle-business-beca...

"do what you love and money will come after years of hard work" I think you would increase your chances of success dramatically if you would just look to solve problems rather than trying to do something that you love.

You would have a bigger variety of options (you can't LOVE doing everything), and you will feel less guilty when it is time to ditch an idea for another one.

Working hard is not a requirement to success, it is a favourable factor.

You'd better test ideas quicker and see which one sticks and then work hard on that idea once it has been validated.

For each "we made it after 10 years of hard work" story, there are millions of "we wasted 10 years of our lives on the wrong problem" stories.

This. A million times this (and the parent comment too.)

Maybe it should be better to say working smarter which includes not wasting so much time and validate idea. I agree with your argument.

Of course you should do what people need. But it's easier when you solve someones problem and you like what you do.

Yes I agree with that. I used to develop Facebook games. I was making money but I lost interest because I felt I was wasting people's time. Since then I have decided to only work on "useful" applications.

Buy and sell stuff. Christmas is coming up, you could package together different things and sell them as gifts. Easy and cheap to test with Shopify and some Google, Facebook, Reddit, Stumbleupon ads.

When you do that, you're bound to notice lots of niggling problems about selling stuff online. Then you can make something that solves those problems, and sell that to other retailers.

I want to ask - does it matter if they are? I find it hard to believe that anyone could just strike gold accidentally on their first app

Why not build something related to your interests? That way you can expand as you learn, instead of expecting a solid income from day one.

A lot of the advice already offered is good, specifically the "find a problem" meme, but I would also caution you that Lifestyle businesses are very different from startups, generally.

In my opinion (and I invite opposing views, because this is just me here) a lifestyle business should generally be started in an area you have solid experience in. It's very hard to relate to your customers if you don't understand their problem, and it's even harder to fix their problem if you don't understand what other challenges your solution may create.

Everyone I know with a lifestyle business is involved in something they've always done. FASO[1], which recently posted here[2], does very well in what basically amounts to a niche photo sharing business (no offense intended). As I understand it, Clint, the founder of that business, had significant experience in the area from having run an art gallery before then. To him, the solutions were probably very obvious -- To you, probably not so much.

Not saying it can't be done obviously, but in trying to pick a lifestyle business, the one closer to your core knowledge set is the way to go, otherwise you'll need to consider how much time it will take to understand your customers, understand the problem, understand why nobody else has already solved it, and if they've tried, understand where they've failed.

[1] - http://faso.com/ [2] - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3103389

I think that's great advice. I'm trying to design a lifestyle business right now too. One other thing I thought of is that it doesn't just need to be one thing- it could be several small niche things, that when added together bring in lifestyle money.

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