Is there anything that is called as a bad startup?

Hey arthanari
There is a framework I like to use to measure my ideas. It is called the "Jobs to be done" framework. I learned about it from this book called "Competing against luck"
https://www.audible.com/pd/Business/Competing-Against-Luck-Audiobook/B01IIB5OTO?ref=a_search_c3_lProduct_1_1&pf_rd_p=e81b7c27-6880-467a-b5a7-13cef5d729fe&pf_rd_r=GN83PABW7HC670TRSXP5&

The basic gist is people aren't looking for products and they aren't necessarily looking to fix problems. They are looking for ways to get certain jobs done.

One of the main examples in the book is called the "milk shake dilemma" where people were buying milk shakes early in the morning. When they looked into the reason people were doing this, they found that people wanted the milk shakes because they had a long drive ahead of them for their morning commute. Shakes are easy to eat one handed, kept the drive interesting, and the customer wasn't hungry by the time their 10 o'clock meeting rolled around. In other words the milk shake was the best product to get the job done.

I think your best business ideas will come when you identify a job lots of people are trying to get done and no other product is doing the job well. Once you have identified the right job you can build a brand and company culture around getting that job done well. Customers will love you for it and will be willing to pay premium prices.

Is every startup worth considering?

• Not sure. It's definitely not worth you thinking about *every possible startup idea (instead of just picking one you like and getting your hands dirty)

Is every idea worth pursuing?

• I personally don't think ideas (in the startup/product sense) are worth pursuing in the vast majority of cases. Customer problems, on the other hand, are often worth pursuing. But definitely not always.

Does every product need to be validated by market to identify its bad?

• Depends what you mean by bad. If bad == "can't be turned into a successful business", then probably yes. And that's just for starters.

Why some fail in deducing that their startup idea is just bad upfront?

• From my own experience and seeing a lot of founders struggling on the IH forum, I think the most common problem founders face is that they focus too much on building a product and not enough on solving a really important problem for their customers.

• A close second is that founders often underestimate how time/cost intensive acquiring customers will be.

• Neither of these two hurdles can be known a priori.

Is every question worth asking?

• No (IMO). Really good founders can zero in on what's really important and/or what's urgent. That means purposefully leaving some questions unasked.