Ask HN: Are startups a good market?

5 points·tchock23··6 comments

I'm considering launching a tool that would help entrepreneurs validate whether their startup idea has merit. It would be mostly targeted to web startups, but could have broader applications to other entrepreneurs as well.

My question is this - do startups pay (in general)? Does anyone have experience targeting the broader startup ecosystem as a market?

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Yes, and I would say it's much easier to make businesses pay than consumers. As a startup founder myself (http://www.gotealeaf.com), if your product helps me 1) increase revenue 2) cut cost 3) reduce risk 4) save time, paying is a no brainer.

The key difference is this: when you target consumers, people tend to have a fixed budget on discretionary spending and a fixed amount of time to pay with their attention. You will be competing with the big players with their unlimited marketing dollars, polished content, and not to mention the countless startups that are piling on.

When you target business, if you can help me with any of the above 4, just "shut up and take my money"

Off topic (but curious):

@knwang - Have you tested your headline?

Testing now - what do you think? :)

Would probably need to know more about what it does, but as a bootstrapped startup, we've been very frugal about what we spend money on. To knwang's point, the value prop would have to be abundantly clear (which is always the case). Saving money isn't as important as saving time. Time, as you've probably heard, is the scarcest resource to startups.

Have a look at what unbounce, launchrock, kickofflabs, etc. are doing, as it sounds like you're in a similar space.

When you say validate the merit of the idea, what do you mean exactly? As in what will you offer startups that they cannot do themselves?

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