My problem is that I rarely get any ideas I notice. Maybe I'm not doing enough stuff? Maybe all my stuff is very basic? Is there something else that I could do everyday that will "exercise my mind" for coming up with business ideas?
Pick a topic, product, food, restaurant, etc. at random and think of (then write down) at least one way to improve it (even if subjective).
Now for each propose at least one method of doing it. If you don’t know how, then take a minute to google the processes that lead up to the improvement... slowly you internalize that knowledge and it becomes second nature.
It’s an exercise, but after a week or two you will come to do it naturally. Just make sure you tell people your ideas if your not going to use them.
I’ve found that when you “release” an idea, better ones follow.
I think a lot about spreadsheets. If a person made a spreadsheet to get something done, it might mean there’s no solution/accessible options available.
Finally, I think about stuff that sucks. A lot of things seem like they could be fixed by some automation, and it seems to be the low hanging fruit of business ideas. Invention, manufacturing, etc. I think benefit from an entire explicit process for idea generation.
In my notes I have more ideas then time now cause everywhere I go I see things that could be solved. Just many of them are not worth enough to do as a business, others that are worth it require significant capital (so more due diligence to explore there) and still others I am exploring myself deeper all the time. But you'll find when you stop trying to dream up fancy new ideas and start looking at processes and pains around you and in other peoples lives, businesses etc you'll find an unlimited supply of ideas. Some of those ideas are incremental, others are transformative and either can be lucrative and fun.
Many of the challenges that would lead to a revenue generating idea seem (to me) to come from something that isn't regularly discussed - something basic along the pipeline that causes someone, somewhere down the pipeline a small and/or large headache - with varying degrees of course.
Let us take a small peek at Stripe, they identified a piece of the puzzle by creating a solution for online business payments. That is awesome and all but I want to detract from that into a more manageable scale. What do you find is a headache, to any degree? Maybe a prebuilt excel sheet for those who don't whelm the power of being an excel guru. Perhaps an app that allows drivers to simply upload a receipt every time they get gas to track average mpg - with some nice extras that could track mileage. The market is flush with these type of solutions. I think the real challenge is pushing beyond the idea of this mindset being challenging.
Think of all the moving parts vs the large scale. You'll be sure to find something along the way, I guarantee it.
I come up with an idea for an invention about every other month. Usually they've already been implemented, or wouldn't have a large enough market.
“wouldn't have a large market” - a billion dollar idea is not the only idea that should be chased. a corner shop owner can earn more than an office worker dreaming about becoming the next elon musk. as do thousands of nice products.
I saw one of those geometric balls that expand and contract at the gift shop of the Smithsonian. I thought, what if they use something like that in a transmission instead of multiple gears? You could have one like that which expands and contracts with a smaller one that varies much less but just changes the pitch of the teeth to fit the big one. The next decade they came out with CVTs which objectively were a better design using (very basically) two rollers that change geometry.
In middle school, I created an invention for that young inventor program run by Sears. I made a device that would slide up and down on the side of an extension ladder. It was a basket to hold paint or tools. I couldn't find anything like it back then. 20 years later and I see an infomercial one. Perhaps this was my best idea I ever had. Sadly I was just a kid and never patented or sold them. I didn't even win the competition.
Business is recognizing problems, and then solving them for a profit. The problems can be yours or others'. The "definition" of a problem is a gap between a current state and a desired state that one does not know how to overcome. You can train yourself by looking for signs of problems such as anxiety, frustration, ranting, complaining, and then digging deeper instead of shrugging it off as another day in the office.
I helped people with tiny businesses get in touch with huge auto-manufacturers simply by designing great looking documents with a LaTeX template and designing a commercial offer. I helped others to decide to make chemical products by digging into chemical compounds and having spectroscopies and other lab experiments done after a nightly conversation in a forest where I pulled a notebook and a pen and started listing price points and products because they complained they were being excluded by product wholesalers. I helped others by making software that generates the right document for the right bank for their clients after getting cofee. I helped others move money around, or deal with vendors abroad, or work on an HR system for a sixty thousand person organization, etc... This was when I was a student/fresh graduate and had some time to spare and the result of conversations where I didn't say "It sucks, man."
One funny thing is that you end up as the "go-to person", a "fixer" of sorts, and more and more people bring you their problems or bring you people who have a problem. It becomes a game of solving problems.
The gist of this is paying attention and recognizing problems, and then paying attention to your attitude towards problems. What do you do with them.
- [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrosses_%C3%A0_cinq_sols
instead do what you quoted - go out there, pick a field, do stuff in it and learn what you can either do better, different, or more of the same if the market allows. ideas come from ingredients and the more you have the more you can bake.
