I wasted months building things nobody wanted
I wasted months building things nobody wanted.
Not because I couldn’t build.
But because I didn’t validate hard enough first.
So I built a simple tool for myself:
You enter a startup idea, and it tells you:
– is this worth building?
– what’s the real risk?
– what should happen next?
I just put a live demo here:
https://zyqerion.ai/demo.html
Curious what people here think.
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My threshold ended up being: will someone pull out a credit card or block time in their calendar for this? Not "do you like this idea" but "when are you buying" or "when are you showing up." People will tell you something is useful all day long and never actually use it. The willingness to pay or commit time question cuts through that much faster than any survey.
That’s a really strong way to think about it — especially the “block time” part.
I’ve noticed something similar, but also struggled with this:
Even when someone would pay or commit time, it still doesn’t always mean the idea turns into something sustainable.
Almost like there’s a gap between “people want this” and “this is worth building a business around.”
Have you found any signal that helps you distinguish between those two?
Curious if anyone here has actually figured out a reliable way to decide what’s worth building before starting?
Feels like most validation advice sounds good in theory, but is still surprisingly hard to apply in practice.
Something I’ve been thinking about after posting this:
Even when you try to validate early, it’s still surprisingly hard to answer one simple question:
“Is this actually worth building?”
Not:
– is it a real problem
– not even if people say they want it
But whether it’s strong enough to turn into something sustainable.
That’s actually why I built the tool I mentioned — to force a clearer answer before committing months to it.
Curious how others here think about that:
What’s your personal “threshold” for deciding something is worth building vs just interesting?
Interesting discussion I had earlier today with another builder here about signal vs noise in ideas.
One thing that stood out:
Even when a problem is real, it doesn’t always mean it’s worth building a product around.
That gap between “real problem” and “worth building” is something I’ve been thinking a lot about lately.
Curious how others here think about that — how do you decide if something is actually worth pursuing?