Startup Idea Frameworks

Last updated: December 12, 2023

Ongoing compendium of frameworks to come up with startup ideas.

1. Surf the Wave

Find big trends and jump into them. “A rising tide lifts all boats”. Don’t complicate yourself by wondering if the market will become saturated. Current examples of trends could be something broad, like AI, or something more niche, like homeschooling.

Example: Jeff Bezos didn’t think twice. He thought: “The internet is growing a lot, I’ll get into that.”

2. Great Artists Steal

Originality is overrated. Just pick a business you like and copy it. Of course, you will put your own spin on it. Even if your business is essentially the same as the other one, you can position yourself differently with the right marketing strategy.

Example: Facebook basically copied MySpace, with a couple of killer features that made all the difference.

3. Service Finder

Help people find, filter, and classify some kind of service providers. To monetize, you can give the service providers the option to be featured or have the finders pay for premium features. You can aggregate the service providers from the internet, so no need for them to register on the website.

Example: a service that lets you find property managers.

4. Packaged Data - Manual

Get data from industry insiders, package it, and sell it. This usually involves doing cold outreach and talking to people for high-quality, verified insights.

5. Packaged Data - Automated

Get data (from APIs or scraping), aggregate it, and package it nicely.

Example: Snow Forecast is the go-to place for skiers wanting to find out about the upcoming weather conditions on ski resorts.

6. Bureaucracy Killer

When a process is complex and time-consuming, offer a faster, simpler way.

Example: Airhelp makes claiming compensation for delayed flights much easier.

7. Free Online Tool

Make a free online tool and then either charge for advanced features or use it as lead generation to sell another product or service.

Example: remove.bg lets you remove the background from your images.

8. Audience First

Start making content, then monetize it. Pick a platform, like YouTube, Instagram, or your own blog. Once you achieve critical mass, sell something your audience might be interested in (with enough people, ads can work too). Newsletters fit into this model.

Example: Kylie Cosmetics by Kylie Jenner.

An alternative is to start the audience with the end in mind. For example, if you eventually want to send

An alternative is to start the audience with the end in mind. For example, if you eventually want to send

9. What Happens In Excel

Any periodic process that is done in an Excel spreadsheet can be improved by creating a dedicated tool for that purpose.

Credit to Rob Walling for the insight.

10. Bundling

When you have to open many tabs or applications to achieve something, that’s a job that could be better done with a specific app. A lot of tasks benefit in having all the data in one place. Take a process that requires multiple apps and programs and bundle it into one application.

11. Unbundling

Go specific, not broad. For example, find niches on reddit, hackernews, or facebook and build a better place for people who are into that niche. Or you can find a bloated application that has too many features and improve upon its most important feature.

12. Sleepy Elephants

Get into a space dominated by big, old companies, which tend to be slow. Position yourself as a more agile and user-friendly solution.

Example: Neobanks became an alternative to the incumbents: bigger, older banks.

13. Beautifully Done

Take a simple idea and excel at marketing. Make “beauty” a priority, which can mean prioritizing aesthetics or creating an incredible customer experience. Credit to My First Million podcast for this concept.

Example: Clay is a CRM… but beautifully done.

14. For Power Users

Find users who depend on a product and use it a lot. Then build a product specially for them.

Example: Superhuman is a premium email service for email power users.