I have a business idea that is relatively simple, so simple that if I ask people if they would buy it, it would instantly give away what it is/how easy it is to make it and someone with more experience could easily steal it. Therefore I think the only way to find out if there is a market for this is to try and gather sentiment about the particular subject this product addresses. I am not really sure how to do this, or if it’s even worth doing as this might not be very expensive to at least try and see if it takes off. Does anyone have any tips on how I might approach this? Should I just spend the couple hundred bucks it would take to create a website, run a few digital ads, and see if there is any engagement?
I agree with some of what u/AnonJian said - as soon as you put it out there somebody could copy it (unless it’s something so specific that you start a patent process which is slow and expensive). You need what you’re working on to be able to stand against competitors and being the first isn’t normally enough medium/long term.
BUT - What I’d say is that you can maybe research the problem your idea solves. Unless there’s a real world problem that enough people have and are willing to pay you enough to cover your costs then it’s irrelevant how good or unique an idea it is.
So: focus in on the problem you think you’re solving. If it’s a real problem that many people have there will be places those people are talking about it or sharing existing ways of working around the problem. That could be conferences, online forums, youtube videos, newspaper articles, Q&As etc. If people really want the problem solved better and are really likely to pay for that solution then they’ll probably be happy to explain the details of their version/experience of it and why it’s an issue.