Before diving deep into hardware development, validate your idea.
Shortcuts at this stage are fatal. The more properly and deeply you work on validation, the less likely you are to end up with a warehouse full of boxes with devices that not enough people want to get you off the ground. The stakes are really high.
Identify the Problem and Target Audience
The most impactful products are those we build to solve our own problems. Are you creating a product to solve your own pain?
Answer this question: What problem does my solution address? Who am I creating this for? Are they willing to pay for the solution? The only way to find out the answer to the last question is to go and sell, as scary as it sounds.
We live in the golden age of target marketing. Go to forums, Reddit, Twitter, LinkedIn, and find people who are facing similar problems. Engage with them. Observe what they are saying. Identify the target group that is looking for a solution to the problem you are solving and might need your product. Make a list.
Even if you plan to do crowdfunding via platforms like Kickstarter, it still requires prior work to get a critical mass of backers to hit virility on the platform. So, once you launch, you have a carefully prepared email list that you started to collect in the validation step.
Engagement: The Key to Validation
Begin by sharing your concept with close contacts facing similar problems. Gradually extend your reach, moving from familiar circles to the "scary" task of engaging with strangers. Engage with customers as soon and as frequent as possible.
Prototyping and Market Testing
Now, it's time to sell your solution. But what are you selling? Essentially, a prototype as basic as possible - crafted from nothing but duct tape and sheer will. Think simple and quick, using whatever materials you have. Spending more than a week on your initial prototype is a failure. Temporary brokenness > Permanent paralysis. Perfectionism is fear of criticism. Aim to create a basic version of your product within a week, and in the following week, pitch it to your identified target audience (cold emails, DMs).
The objective is rapid feedback from the target user.
Focus on the users' interaction with your product rather than their words. Comments like, "It's cool, but I'd buy it if it had this feature." - red flag. If you get many of them, the pain doesn’t exist, or maybe you're selling to the wrong crowd. Back to the drawing board. Does your product solve a real problem, a real need? Did you correctly identify the target customer?
My Experience
Once I committed to the idea, it took a few weeks to launch the first pilot.
I started with a wireless charger I bought on Alibaba. I personally installed it in the first café that agreed to test it, learned a ton, realized the problem existed, but wireless charging was not the right solution—so, I moved on to portable battery chargers provided by fully automated stations that do not require any management from location employees. Constant iterations led to a close-to-perfect solution.
Conclusion: Moving Forward with Confidence
Once you've thoroughly validated your idea and confirmed that it addresses a real pain move to the next development phase. Validation is not just about proving your idea's worth but also about refining it to ensure it meets the market's needs as closely as possible.
I Want to Hear from You
What's the biggest challenge you've faced in turning your idea into a product? Any specific topics you want to learn more about? Let's get the conversation started.
