What Is My Idea Worth? Not As Much As You Think…

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While the exploration of ideas is a consistent theme in this blog, I felt it was important to drive home a point that is often overlooked when drumming up new ideas or starting new businesses. And that is that execution and monetization of an idea is where the real value lies. There are an immeasurable …Read More

Open Source Software for the Enterprise

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There is no shortage of great ideas floating around right now. Unfortunately, as much value as we like to put on our good ideas, failure to execute on them means they turn out to be little more than dreams with practical application but no realization. However, over the past few years, the open source movement …Read More

Idea Lifecycle Pt. 7 – Sustain/Improve

As long as we own a product,idea or business, there really is no end to it for us until we choose to kill it (which is sometimes the right choice) or sell it off. Until then, we should seek to continually improve upon the product, marketing and delivery of that product though we can say …Read More

Idea Lifecycle Pt. 6 – Monetize

This may not actually be your favorite part, but it’s likely to be your favorite result! The fact is that the monetization phase is probably the most difficult and is as much an art as it is a discipline. In this phase we get to do things like: Determine the ideal price. It needs to …Read More

Idea Lifecycle Pt. 5 – Test

Ahhh testing! Having spent years as a developer, I can tell you this was about the least exciting part of the process next to maintenance. It’s brutal on your ego and some of the feedback you’ll get can be downright brutal, so be prepared. But like many things that are “less fun” to deal with …Read More

Idea Lifecycle Pt. 4 – Build It

Other than coming up with the idea this is probably my favorite part of the process. Getting hands on and creating/building the product is fun and really what it’s all about. What about “Monetization” you ask? Making money is of course essential and fun in it’s own right but this is really about getting to …Read More

Idea Lifecycle Pt. 3 – The Market

Up to this point we have still existed in a bit of a cloud. We had fun brainstorming an idea or two, and got through the work of defining that the idea we like best. In looking at the market we now get to figure out whether or not everyone else will take to our …Read More

Idea Lifecycle Pt. 2 – Define

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I’ll start with a confession. “Define” is not my favorite part of the process because we jump from freely associating (fun) to analyzing our idea in much greater detail which feels more like work. Define is also tough because it is the first step at which an idea we think might be a winner can …Read More

Idea Lifecycle Pt.1 – Discovery

idea matrix phase 1

I come up with new ideas almost everyday, many of them out of the blue, yet don’t get side tracked from the ideas I’m actively working on. Lets do a deeper dive to better understand where those ideas come from and how to keep focus. Along the way, be sure to capture your ideas in …Read More