The workflow test for finding strong AI ideas

Plenty of big companies are moving fast with AI.

But they often don’t ship the strongest versions of certain AI products — not because they’re slow, but because they’re constrained.

They optimize for:

• "One product for millions of users"

• Protecting their brand

• Legal/regulatory exposure

• Enterprise procurement and security reviews

• Internal alignment and incentives

This creates gaps.

You can build something small and specific that works well for a single task.

Here’s how to find the gaps.

Step 1 – Pick who you’re building for

Start with a real job title.

Pick:

• One role (real job title)
• One “home base” where they already work (a tool or system: Gmail, HubSpot, Salesforce, Zendesk, Notion, Sheets, etc.)
• One broad area of work (prospecting, reporting, screening, support replies, onboarding, etc.)

For example: an SDR inside HubSpot, working on outbound prospecting.

This gives you a clear place to start looking for gaps.

Step 2 – Make sure AI is actually useful here

AI works best when the work is:

• Repeated often
• Text-heavy
• Rule-based (checklists, rubrics, “if X then Y”)
• Context-heavy (docs, history, fields)
• Handed off to someone else (manager/client/other team)

If none of these are true, the “gap” usually won’t be strong enough.

Step 3 – Find the gap

Pick one tool your user already uses.

A general AI can do a lot one time if you paste everything in.

The gap is when it needs to work every week, for a team, inside the real tool, with little cleanup.

Now do this:

A) Write down the real deliverable

Ask: What do they hand to someone else when the work is done?

If you can’t name the deliverable, you don’t have a product idea yet.

B) Check three places in the tool

• Templates
• Settings
• Export / integrations

Ask: “Can this tool make the deliverable inside the tool, with almost no cleanup, every time?”If not, you’ve found a gap. Now, name why.

C) Name the reason

Most general tools fail because of one of the following:

• Rules: it doesn’t follow the rules the same way each time
• Company context break: it doesn’t use your docs, terms, policies, or fields right
• Format break: it doesn’t give the right format
• Workflow break: can’t do all steps across tools
• Proof or audit break: it doesn’t show why it chose the answer

Pick the biggest one.

D) Write 3–5 lines like this:

“Tool does X, but fails at Y. I’ll build Y for \[role\] in \[tool\].”

E) Score each idea. Add 1 point if:

• It happens every week
• Inputs are easy to get
• The output is used for real work
• It needs little fixing
• Value is easy to prove

Pick the one with 4–5 points.

Step 4 – Make sure someone will actually use it

Do this (in order):

• Try it on your own work (if you’ve done the job)
• Find proof online (people complaining / doing it manually)
• Do some lightweight outreach: DM 5 people with one question
• If someone is interested, offer a small paid pilot: build the smallest version using their real inputs

Stop when 2–3 people say, “Yes, I’ll try it,” and share real inputs. If one of them agrees to a small paid pilot, even better!