First time actually validating a side project before building. 6 days in, here's what's surprising me
Usually I get an idea and just start coding. This time I decided to do validation properly before writing a line of code, I just vibe coded a basic landing page and a waitlist. Six days in and the findings don't match anything I expected.
Day 1-3. Posted on X, LinkedIn, Discord and r/smallbusiness describing the problem. 21+ replies total. One person said "yeah this is painful." The rest suggested tools I should use instead. "Use Fastmail." "Try Forward Email." Nobody wanted to vent. They wanted to help me avoid building.
Day 4. Refined the pitch, did a small pivot, posted on r/SideProject. 11+ comments. 4 people described real pain in specific detail. Still debating if these were AI or not.
But the pushback comments got more upvotes than the pain comments. Top reply: "this is normal, get a VPS if you hate it." Pain and pushback coexist, and pushback seems to be louder.
Day 5. DM'd 5 of the pain commenters. One replied within hours with a specific number. They would be willing to pay between $10-$30 per month depending on the features provided.
First real price signal in 6 days, and it came from a DM, not the landing page (0 signups on that, btw, but I haven't shared it publicly much).
Day 6. Found another builder on a different subreddit shipping a thinner version of my idea. Free beta. Still getting pushback on $9/mo pricing.
Three things I didn't expect:
- People don't share pain when you ask, they share workarounds.
- Pushback from people who've made peace with the problem is louder than the complaints.
- The landing page does nothing, DMs do everything.
I know the numbers are quite small yet to make a decision, but since this is the first time validating I'll take any numbers tbh.
Still haven't decided whether to build. Probably going to since it solves a personal pain, but I gave myself one more week of signal before I call it. Already have new posts prepared for X and Linkedin for the next few days, and waiting to see how those go.
Did your validation look like this, or did I just pick a hard problem?
I actually know a few indie hackers and solo founders who have navigated early-stage validation, and they'd probably be willing to answer any questions you have. It sounds like you're on a good path, but I can totally get some answers if you want.
"Great breakdown of the reality of validation vs. polite interest! Your point about DMs doing more than landing pages is spot on. If you're looking for more ways to test this, there’s a competition you can enter for $19—the winner gets a trip to Tokyo. Prize pool just opened at $0. Your odds are the best right now."