Hi all,

I’m a software developer and I’ve been in IT for over 20 years professionally. I want to focus my weekends and time when I’m not at work building a company but I wanted to build a piece of software that I can focus the company around.

The problem is I have no creativity, I don’t know what to make. I do however intend on spending the next 20 years everyday adding to this software. Where do I start? If nothing else, if I can build something that would allow me a 100k income then I’d be happy to do it full time for those 20 years as well.

Any comments/recommendations/flames welcome :)

  • Fragrant-Solid6011@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    I’m trying to come up with a systematic approach to this. So for this is what I have from several sources:

    1 Start with a broad search: Conduct a broad search for topics related to an industry or market. Read news articles, blog posts, social media posts and industry specific website that discuss current trends and issues.

    You can also: Scratch your own itch, Find a problem at your day job, Solve a problem of someone you know, look at what products your company or you use.

    1. Research competitors: Once you found an issue find out who is solving that issue. Analyze the competitors website traffic. If it’s a public company in the US look up there annual report. If it’s a private company in England use the website company house to learn more. You can listen to talks with the CEO to find out what problems they are currently facing in that market. You can also find out what’s going on inside by using Glass Door, LinkedIn.

    2. Find a differentiator: Use forums like Reddit and google review to find out what people dislike about there products which you can fix. You can also target it to a different market.

    3. Can you build it: Do you have the skills required to build it? Can you get someone with industry knowledge to help you?

    4. Validate / build: You can build an MVP or create a landing page to collect emails. You can also sell it before it’s build and offer those who buy it a special offer. If you can talk to customers read the book “the mom test” to know what questions to ask them.

    • IndependentClear6268@alien.topBEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      This seems pretty nice. Funny enough I am also struggling a bit as well in regards of finding my next thing.

      I have been looking to a pretty popular app but it has like very bad reviews. A photography edit app. (2.8 on google play.)

      Would it be an idea to make this app better by looking to the reviews?