Direct answers to the questions founders actually ask

Build three lists in 1-2 days, not six weeks. (1) Direct competitors: same-shape products in your category. (2) Indirect competitors: different shape, same job. (3) Do-nothing competitors: what buyers are doing today instead of paying for any solution. For each, capture pricing, last-funding signal, top 3 buyer complaints from public reviews. Then run the underserved-niche test: which segment do all the existing players underserve, and is there a 7-Powers angle there?

Run six honest tests. (1) Is there a defined buyer with budget? (2) Is the pain frequent and intense, not annoying? (3) Will buyers commit money or time? (4) Do you have a defensible angle (one of the 7 Powers)? (5) Does the unit economics math work at a price they'd pay? (6) Is the timing present-tense, not 'someday'? Pass four of six and keep going. Fail four and walk away. The rest is theatre.

Run the 9-step pre-code playbook with three SaaS-specific tweaks. (1) Validate the pricing MODEL before the price NUMBER; the model is hard to change post-launch. (2) Apply the LTV/CAC > 3 unit-economics gate. (3) Use the Superhuman PMF Engine post-launch as your canonical PMF measure. Otherwise: defined buyer, real pain, defensible angle, behavioral evidence, defended price, scoped V1.

Run nine framework-backed decisions in order before writing code: define the buyer, prove the pain is painful, name the winning angle, scope V1 to the smallest test of the hypothesis, get behavioral evidence (paid pre-orders, signed letters of intent, or credit cards on file from a Fake Door Test), then ship. Most failed startups skipped at least three of those nine. Plan to spend two to four weeks on this. It saves six to nine months of building the wrong thing.

Two to four weeks of focused work for a single idea. Stage 1 (market verdict) takes a day. Stages 2-3 (buyer + pain) take a week of interviews. Stage 4 (positioning) takes two days. Stage 5 (V1 scope) takes a day. Stages 6-7 (pricing + behavioral evidence) take 1-2 weeks because you need 20+ buyers and a Fake Door Test running. ShipFit compresses the decision time to 30-60 minutes; the gating work is the human conversations between stages.

Three nested market-sizing numbers. TAM (Total Addressable Market) is the entire global demand for the category. SAM (Serviceable Addressable Market) is the slice you could serve given your channels and geography. SOM (Serviceable Obtainable Market) is what you could realistically capture in 1-3 years. Most founders inflate TAM and skip SOM. The honest move is the opposite: start at SOM, work up. The ten-customer version of your business is more useful than the $10B TAM slide nobody believes.

Use Rahul Vohra's Superhuman PMF Engine. (1) Survey active users with the Sean Ellis question 'how would you feel if you could no longer use this?'. (2) Segment respondents by 'very disappointed' / 'somewhat disappointed' / 'not disappointed'. (3) Profile your fans (the very disappointed) to find your real ICP. (4) Build a roadmap that's half doubling-down on what fans love and half closing the on-the-fence blockers. (5) Re-run quarterly. The score should rise.

The state where a product satisfies a strong market demand from a specific buyer segment such that customer pull on the product exceeds the founder's effort to push it. Coined by Marc Andreessen in 2007 ('the only thing that matters'). Operational measure: 40%+ of active users would be 'very disappointed' if they could no longer use it (Sean Ellis test, popularized by Rahul Vohra at Superhuman in 2018). Below 40%, you don't have PMF yet, regardless of revenue or press.

Apply Rob Fitzpatrick's Mom Test discipline. Never mention your idea (it contaminates the conversation). Ask about specific past behavior, not future hypotheticals ('what did you do last time' beats 'would you use this'). Listen 80% of the time. Look for commitments (time, money, reputation), not compliments. Run 10-15 interviews per buyer segment; patterns stabilize around interview 10. Below that you have anecdotes, not signal.

Narrow in four passes. (1) Start with the broad category your idea sits in. (2) Filter by buyer behavior: who currently has this problem and is doing something about it? (3) Filter by reach: who can you actually contact via the channels you have today? (4) Filter by willingness to pay: who has budget authority and a price point that clears your unit economics? The output is a specific buyer profile you could name 10 people who match. If you can't, you haven't narrowed enough.

Use the Jobs-to-be-Done switch format: 'When [situation], I want to [motivation], so I can [outcome].' Drawn from real buyer interviews, not your hypotheses. The statement should make a specific person feel a specific moment. Pass four tests: it names a real situation, the buyer can identify the moment, the outcome is measurable, and at least 3 unrelated buyers describe the same problem in similar words.

The first phase of Steve Blank's Customer Development methodology (2005). The work of finding out whether the problem you think exists actually exists, for the buyer you think has it. It precedes customer validation (proving the buyer will pay). Customer discovery uses interviews and observation; customer validation uses behavioral evidence (pre-orders, signed LOIs, paid pilots). Both are required before scaling.

The smallest version of a product that lets you test a single, falsifiable hypothesis about a buyer's behavior. Coined by Frank Robinson in 2001; popularized by Eric Ries in The Lean Startup (2011). Often not a working product at all (a landing page, a Wizard of Oz prototype, a manual concierge service). The defining feature: it can fail. If your MVP can't fail, it's not an MVP, it's just a small launch.

Three honest tiers. DIY: $0-200 in books + 60-100 hours of your time over 6-10 weeks. ShipFit: $5 for a Quick Take, $10 for a full playbook, $19-99/mo subscription. Strategy consultant: $5,000-25,000 for a 4-8 week engagement. Hidden cost across all three: ~$50-200 for buyer-interview coffee. The number to compare against: the $20K-80K it costs to skip validation and ship the wrong thing.

Five honest questions. (1) Are you ok losing 12-24 months of income? (2) Do you have a specific problem you keep coming back to, or is the appeal generic? (3) Can you handle being wrong publicly for 6+ months? (4) Do you have one validated idea (not just enthusiasm)? (5) Are you doing this because you want to OR because you think you should? Yes to 4-5: probably worth starting. Yes to 0-2: not yet, and that's fine. Most successful founders said yes to all five before quitting.