a nel more about your customers and what they want, you 7 yourself overwhelmed with ideas. What should you do aad vou have more ue than time to pursue them? Two things: . € sure you're capturing all the ideas and writing them down, since you might want them later; second, find a way to evalu- ate competing ideas. Creating a “possibilities list” helps you retain ideas for when you have more time to implement them. Most of the time, however, having an idea isn’t a problem for entrepreneurs.* Once you begin to think of opportunities, you'll Probably end up with no shortage of ideas written on napki scrawled in notebooks, and floating around in your head. ee “Where Do Ideas Come From?” on page 27-coche. 4 86 THE $100 STARTUP problem is evaluating which projects are worth pursuing, ang deciding between different ideas. Sometimes you may knees tively what the best move is. In those eS, You should as without hesitation, Other times, though, you'll feel confcey What should you do? ‘The decision-mal projects and separate the winners from the “maybe laters.” Putting "t mean you'll never do it, but prioritization ing matrix will help you evaluate a range of something off doe will help you get started on what makes the most impact. Firs of all, keep in mind the most basic questions of any’ successful micro- business: + Does the project produce an obvious product or service? + Do you know people who will want to buy it? (Or do you know where to find them?) * Do you have a way to get paid? ‘Those questions form a simple baseline evaluation. If you don’t have a clear yes on one of them, go back to the drawing board. Let’s assume, however, that you can answer yes to all of them but know you can’t pursue five big projects at one time. In that case, you'll need some method of evaluation. Here’s one option: the decision-making matrix. eo [—]inme Teron Tt [ von | eo? | =n | = | ry —Fa THE NEW DEMOGRAPHICS a tnhis matrix, you'll list your ideas in the left-hand column and ase them onascaleof 1105, with being the highest, Granted, the sing wl be subjective, but since we're looking for trends, it’s Ok toestimate. Score your ideas according to these criteria: Impact: Overall, how much of an impact will this project make on your business and customers? Effort: How much time and work will it take to create the project? (In this case, a lower score indicates more effort, so choose | for a project that requires a ton of work and § for « projet that requires almost no work.) Profitability: Relative to the other ideas, how much money will the project bring in? Vision: How close of a fit is this project with your overall mission and vision? Rank each item on a scale of 1 to 5 and then add them up in the Tight-hand column. Remember, ave to cut one project, cut the lowest one; if you can only take on one project, proceed with the highest one. you're looking for trends. If you Here's an example from my own business, when I was deciding ‘hich business projects to pursue in the second half of 2011: -— [leona [eon [perany [ran vio [oa ing cual 5 5 Cate : 7 FF - 7 = 3 12 ‘Community Buiding F 7 ‘wor . : = ‘Shopping Cart e 3 moe : : = nate onshore S|oN THE $100 STARTUP When you don’t know where to start and havea bunch Of ideas, € workshops would have a big impact on the people who attended them (or so I hoped) but not on anyone else. They would require a great deal this exercise can help. In my case, the liv of prep time and energy and wouldn't be very profitable, Therefore, I put them on hold. The deci ion-making matriy also helps you see the Strengths and weaknesses of your ideas. I liked the idea of small live work- shops until I realized they would require a great deal of work for little reward and impact. That was a big weakness! On the other hand, a project like the webinar represented a middle ground: | didn’t expect the workload to be overwhelming, and I expected it to deliver above-av crage (although not amazing) results.