Is your idea Focused on a problem worth solving

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What is a Burning Hair Problem?

One of the most important aspects of finding an idea that will let your startup scale into a high performing company is finding a problem to solve that is painful / urgent enough that people are desperate to have it solved. This is called finding your customers Burning Hair Problem. A problem so great that it is akin to having their head on fire.

But how do you know if you have found a burning hair problem?

• If you are struggling to get people to talk to you about this problem its probably not a burning hair problem
• If people react to your idea with a meh instead of excitement its probably not a burning hair problem
• If people aren't currently using work arounds and custom solutions to solve this problem it probably isn't a burning hair problem

Burning Hair problems are non optional. They have to be solved. Your head is on fire. That isn't something you wait around to put out. People who are suffering from a problem on this scale are excited to find a solution to it. They want to jump on a call to talk with you about it, and when you show them your idea to solving it they will react with an urgency to get that solution and implement it into their lives.

This is why they are such a powerful thing for your startup to find. They offer you the ability as a founder to create a product that gets wild traction without having to spend thousands on advertising.

Lets illustrate this point with a little story.

It's an extreme analogy but it will help you understand why we encourage founders to search for Burning Hair Problems. It makes everything else much easier.

Picture this. You are sat in a bar drinking with your favourite customer. You are celebrating together and as the night rolls on you decide now would be the opportune time to do flaming shots of tequila. The shots are poured and the barman sets them aflame with great trepidation.

But disaster strikes.

As your customer tilts their neck back, the flaming liquid pour out over their face, spreading white hot flame everywhere and engulfing their head. People are panicking and your customer is too. They start to flail about in the bar looking for something to put this fire out with.

Luckily for your customer, you came prepared. You are carrying a bucket of the most slimy, disgusting water you have ever seen around with you. Just for this very moment. And now is your time to shine.

On any normal day if you asked your customer to dip their head in this bucket of disgusting water they would give you a resolute no. Why would anyone want to dip their head in a bucket of water this disgusting?

Let me tell you who. Those people who have their head on fire.

So you offer this bucket of water to your client which they gladly accept. But being the out and out entrepreneur that you are, you know you now have the ability to charge anything you want to offer the solution to this very real and pressing problem that your customer is facing. So before you hand over the bucket you decide to ask them for their wallet. Which they throw at you in a hurry before plunging their head into your bucket of putrid water.

You see when people are facing a problem that cannot be ignored. Is painful and immediate, they will jump through many hoops in order to have that problem solved. They will pay for that problem to be solved and they will pay gladly. And as an added bonus if the problem really is viewed as a serious problem by your customer they will not need you to create a highly polished, perfect product before they are willing to pay for it. They will use it in its earliest roughest form just to have a chance at solving that problem.

As a founder this should make you take note. If you find a real Burning Hair Problem, not only will people flock towards your solution in an attempt to find some relief to their pain. But they will do so at a much earlier stage in your products life. Meaning you can spend less, launch sooner and get paying customers faster.

But you NEED a Burning Hair Problem to solve first.
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How do I find Burning Hair Problems?

This is a good question to ask. It is the RIGHT question to ask that most founders fail to do. Because it requires you to stop and listen to people. Really observe them and hear about what is causing them pain in their lives or at work.

Many startups are started from a selfish inward looking point of view. It is about the Founder, their idea and what they want to build. But that is wrong, building a company that 'scratches your own itch' and solves a problem you face is fine. It is a good start. But unless you have heard that same story of pain repeating, and validated that it is also experienced by others with enough frequency you are launching something that might just be an expensive custom solution to a problem you and only a handful of others experience.

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Problem Scouting and Asking Killer Questions

I firmly believe that if more founders started their startup journeys with the simple act of asking great questions and listening to the answers that we would avoid many premature startup deaths. According to CB Insights startup post mortem report 42% of all startups go out of business because they build a Product that no one wants or needs.

42%!

This is where Problem Scouting comes in and 5 magic words that will help you discover true burning hair problems that have a chance of getting traction when you test it with a launch later in this playbook.

You can significantly speed up the process of finding a Burning Hair Problem to solve by speaking with the people in your network and listening to their problems. People LOVE to talk about their problems. They will tell you in great detail what causes them pain and what products they would bite your hand off for if you were to be so kind as to make them a reality.

But to do this effectively it requires a specific mindset which we call "Two Ears One Mouth"

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What does 2 Ears One Mouth mean exactly?

This is the process of getting into conversations with people who you potentially want to help solve painful problems for. Then asking them 1 great question and listening to their response. Giving them space to talk about that problem in depth by doing more listening than talking. When you are Problem Scouting and on the search for that big Burning Hair Problem if you find yourself doing more pitching / presenting of your idea than listening you are missing out on an incredible opportunity to listen and discover your $1,000,000 SaaS idea.

Innovation isn't really the art of coming up with a grand bold idea that has never been thought of before. It is much more often a case of intently listening to the needs of a market segment, deepening your understanding and then providing what people have been asking for.

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How Do I Start These Conversations With Potential Customers?

Just Ask!

That might seem like a tongue in cheek response to the question but in all of our work with founders in helping them build, launch and scale their startups we see one very clear differentiator between those who are successful and move forward quickly and those who struggle.

The ones who move fast and get shit done are those who are out there hustling and asking for help/resources.

People love to share their opinions and talk about their problems. If you are conducting this Problem Scouting process in the right way you will actually be creating a really enjoyable experience for your potential customers. Having someone be deeply interested in solving your most painful problems is very magnetic. So if you have a fear that no one will give you their time to share their thoughts with you I want you to put that to one side and just do it anyway.

To start these conversations we need 2 simple components.

1. A list of people to reach out to
2. A simple ask

That is all that is required.

You are going to get your first sense of problem validation by making these asks. If no one will jump on a call with you to talk about this problem then you know it isn't likely to be a problem people care enough about to solve.

There are a few risks we need to watch out for in order to have our outreach be weel received and have a high chance of success:

Limit the ask on their time

Everything has a cost. Spending time with you is a cost.

Some people will happily pay with that time gladly. Others value their time highly and guard it closely.

You must limit the amount of time you are asking for based on the kind of person you are asking to jump on a call with you. A busy executive is not likely to give you 60 mins of their time to talk no matter how highly they care about the problem.

A student who is being incentivised to speak with you with a small Amazon Voucher will give you 60 mins and more without really thinking about it.

We have found that the founders we work with are most successful when they structure their Problem Scouting calls to only last 20 mins.

This gives you enough time to get into some detail without it feeling like a huge ask in the eyes of your potential customers. However there is a psychological trick to this. If you follow our guiding principle of using 2 ears and 1 mouth. Asking killer questions, you will find that no matter who you have on that call they will stay longer.

Speaking about their problems and sharing their opinions to someone who is intently listening is an experience they will find fulfilling and fun. They will lose track of the time and almost certainly spend much more time with you than they would have otherwise agreed to.

So play the smart game and reduce your ask to up the acceptance rate and then create an amazing experience for your research participant to get the maximum value out of it.

Focusing on Solutions no Problems

Some founders dive into their process with a product or solution already in mind. They are brought into the idea of getting further validation from the market but they are looking to prove themselves right. Rather than approaching this with the true Problem Scouting mindset of just setting out to find interesting problems to solve.

This is a mistake and can cause you to pursue the development of a product that the market will not pay for or care about. That is how you find yourself in the 42% of businesses that fail because they build something the market didn't want or need.

You do not lead these conversations by presenting what you are thinking about building. Most people will just agree with you in these conversations that your idea is good, even if they are secretly thinking your idea sucks.

The key to avoiding this trap is to ask good open questions and avoid as much as possible asking closed leading questions.
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What Questions Do I Ask?

Killer Questions.

If you are going to avoid biasing the insights you gain from your problem scouting you need to align your questions around asking great open questions rather than closed direct questions.

You also want to ease your participant into the conversation. Give them a chance to get comfortable, answer some easy questions and then when they are warmed up dive into the more insightful introspective questions that they will need to think to answer.

Closed VS Open Questions

Open questions allow your potential customer to lead you anywhere they want. They facilitate conversation and allow for longer more in depth answer. Closed questions on the other hand are direct. They are usually met with short or single word answers.
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Open questions start with these 5 words:

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What to do if you find yourself on the bottom 2 quadrants?

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How to make your product more valuable

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Freemium sucks!