Show me the incentive and I will show you the outcome.

Charlie Munger

I have recently finished a four year gig as a Chief Information Officer and I am tired of selling hours. I would rather build a sustainable online business. I am a full stack developer and experienced project manager. I can built anything easily – except for a compelling business idea.

The first necessary assumption is that there is an unmet need. Typically unmet needs are only found where business change is rapid. This is for the same reason that there are no £50 notes lying on the pavement – because the first people to see them pick them up. I have chosen Crypto as my target market because it is new and changing rapidly.

So how can I find an unmet need?

I am a great fan of the Lean Start-up and the Business Model Canvas. These both provide useful processes to ideate and capture market opportunities. I now have lots of ideas and some market test results and the problem is deciding into which idea I should invest my limited resources.

I have just come across Charlie’s quote above and I think that this can be a great discriminator. An idea is not investable unless I can clearly state all the stakeholder’s incentives and infer the result.

It has to be so clear that your grandmother can understand it, if it falls short of this test it will fail in the market.

For example,

Skype

• User Incentive: Make international calls for free
• User Outcome: Lots of people use Skype to make international calls

Facebook

• User Incentive: Chat with friends for free in a network
• User Outcome: Exponential growth due to network effects
• Advertiser Incentive: Target users by demographic
• Advertiser Outcome: Demographically targeted ads

Stripe

• Business Incentive: Reduce the number of people who fail to complete PayPal payment flows
• Business Outcome: Lots of businesses use Stripe and make more sales

Red Bull

• User Incentive: A drink with 2x more stimulants than Coke lets you party longer
• User Outcome: Lots of young people buy Red Bull so they can party longer

So what is my investable idea?

You will have to wait and find out but if you would like to be one of the first to find out then sign-up to the mailing list at cryptostar.money.