Choosing the right startup idea to work on
I tend to come up with two to three new ideas per day on average. However, given limited time, I often only work on the ones that I am most excited about at that moment. This approach has led to many incomplete projects, as my excitement can shift from one idea to another.
One potential solution to this issue is to adopt a prioritization strategy that ranks my ideas based on both my passion for them and their probability of success. While some people may prioritize the likelihood of success above all else, I believe that work itself has inherent value, and that I am only truly happy when I work on something I am passionate about.
To avoid negative selection strategies, which can limit the ideas I pursue, I want to focus on identifying the attributes of an idea that excite me the most. For me, these tend to include doing something that has never been done before, helping people who are passionate about their work, and building something that is a pleasure to use. Additionally, I believe that my ideas are more likely to be successful if I have deep expertise in the relevant domain, if they target a niche audience, and if I can build most of the components myself.
To account for the possibility of moving on from an idea that is not working out, I also want to consider introducing a "traction score" that reflects the progress of each idea. This score could start at the same level for all ideas and then move up or down based on the traction they gain at each evaluation. To effectively kill an idea, this score will be applied as a discount rate to the total score. While the absolute numbers of this score may vary depending on the target audience and go-to-market strategy, I will use my judgment to keep things simple and make scoring decisions based on my own experience.
This is how the scoring table looks:
