Two questions I see constantly popping up on forums and Q&A sites are:

1) How can I come up with a business idea?

2) How do I validate an idea I already have?

But for a moment, let’s ignore the numerous answers to these questions and rather explore the customer segment you wish to target. Now lets replace the two questions above with:

Does your target market have the:

1) WILLINGNESS to pay?

2) ABILITY to pay?

These are much more important questions to answer before you go down the path of coming up with or validating an idea. The reason being, do you really want to spend even a minute of your time validating or coming up with an idea for a target market that doesn’t exist?

Now let’s start with QUESTION ONE: the willingness to pay?

There are some target markets that are notoriously difficult to crack: restaurants, small “mum and pop” businesses, cafes etc.

Why?

Most of these business owners don’t have the luxury of spending vast amounts of time analysing ways to improve their business. Their day to day work demands almost all of their attention. It’s often a struggle for these businesses to remain profitable and hence your app idea is probably the last thing they want to consider at the end of a gruelling day.

Ultimately this results in an unwillingness to purchase your product.

However, this is not to say that it is impossible to crack this target market. It simply means that your product should take this into consideration. If you’re building an app:

• Pricing/Monetisation should be a key consideration
• Make it EASY to use.
• Try and not impact on any existing business processes.
• If the app needs to be used during the day to day running of the business, try reduce the number of interactions the user must have with the app. Five interactions per customer can add up to a lot of time over the course of a day.

Truly understanding your customer and their needs will pay large dividends when designing your product/app and improve your chances of success.

On to QUESTION TWO: the ability to pay?

A perfect example for this situation are products or services aimed at young people. You may have a gaming idea that’s even more addictive than Angry Birds and Candy Crush combined but… if the app is based on an expensive monthly subscription model, no matter how much your target market loves your app, they just won’t have the means to pay for it.

In situations like this, it might be a good idea to consider:

• A different monetisation strategy such as ads or small in-app purchases.
• Targeting parents or caregivers (who have the ability to pay) and demonstrate how your app benefits child development. This shouldn’t be marketing spiel but a true outcome of using your app.
• Moving to a freemium model
• Sponsorships whereby you partner with advertisers who will provide your users with rewards for completing certain actions within your app.

So if you are currently thinking of starting a business, consider your target market’s willingness and ability to purchase your goods/services. It could save you a great deal of time and effort!