How to find new ideas for your next online business

One of the most common questions I get asked from clients wanting to build an online business is ‘how can I come up with a business idea?’ The reality is there are ideas everywhere but knowing which ones to run with and which to leave behind are the key to success! Of course, execution of the idea matters enormously but that’s the subject of another blog.

This sounds ridiculously easy but the best way to discover new, untapped business ideas is to just listen – listen to your friends, your children, your colleagues, to strangers (and to yourself) as you go about your daily business – at work, at home, at parties, on trains, at school pick-up, and in particular, listen out for these 3 key phrases:

Why are they important phrases? Because they indicate that a particular need has not been resolved. Unmet needs = new business ideas. This is the easiest, fastest, cheapest way to discover new business ideas.

Let’s take this a step further and reverse engineer what questions might have been the genesis for the creation of a couple of very successful apps and online businesses.

For example

Clearly, you’ll want to do more testing to see if the demand is there, but as for just finding new business ideas, you can’t go past listening out for these key phrases. How hard can be it be to eavesdrop on others’ conversation? It could be the beginning of a profitable venture!