How to find business ideas?

Every day, we come up with fantastic business ideas and are surrounded by them.

The key is to be aware of them.

That’s right — take note. You don’t have to be extremely creative, clever, or original to come up with strong, profitable company ideas (but it helps).

All you have to do is keep an eye on what’s going on around you.

It’ll be difficult to break the habit of seeking for company ideas once you’ve started. You’ll soon discover the perfect concept for you.

The good news is that we are surrounded by business opportunities. You have a business idea if you can find a problem to fix and enough people prepared to pay you to solve it for them. And the “issue” doesn’t have to be massive or overpowering. There’s probably a commercial potential if you can make something faster, cheaper, more pleasurable, or more efficient.

We think you’ll be pleasantly surprised at how experiences, conversations, hobbies, and skill sets combine to stimulate ideas after you get started with the tasks below. We require you to make various lists in a few of the phases. You can write things down on cards or in a notebook, or use a mind-mapping program like Miro to keep track of them.

Miro allows you to organize your thoughts on a single page, move them about, search for connections, take notes, and share your ideas with friends and coworkers. It includes a variety of templates for brainstorming, mind mapping, ideation, workflow, storyboarding, and analysis when you’re ready.

It’s a terrific method to keep track of ideas as they arise, then move them around and experiment with them afterwards to see what type of connections you can build.

And believe us when we say that finding new company ideas is all about building contacts.

Step 1: Start with what makes you happy.

Perhaps you’re a passionate wordsmith, a numbers nerd, or an organizational whiz kid. Perhaps you love talking to strangers or creating presentations or delivering speeches. Or maybe you’re the person everyone calls when their computer stops working.

Understanding and appreciating your abilities can help point you in the direction of interesting business ideas that (bonus) you’ll actually enjoy. Remember to keep an open mind. Being great with numbers doesn’t necessarily mean you should open your own accounting business (though it might). It could lend itself to businesses like tutoring, or it could mean that when you get your business off the ground, you should be the “numbers” person.

If a brilliant idea doesn’t jump out at you immediately, that’s fine. We’re still at Stage One, after all. For now, just start keeping a list of things you love doing.

Step 2: Look for Problems to Solve

Every successful business solves a problem of some kind. For ideas, begin looking around for problems (there are plenty to choose from) and think about ways you could solve them.

There are a lot of problems in the world, and they all represent opportunities for the right person with the right ideas. Tesla is a great example. Elon Musk understood that we can’t continue to rely on fossil fuels and created the first all-electric car to use lithium-ion battery cells. He’s also invested heavily in solar power.

Make a list of “big” issues. Pay special attention to the ones that get you fired up.

Step 3: Give yourself new experiences

You may come up with a million-dollar idea while you’re sitting on your couch watching the latest episode of Ted Lasso. But you’re a lot more likely to come up with innovative ideas — on your couch or anywhere else — if you’re consistently creating new experiences for yourself.

This step is less about lists and more about creating new perspectives.

Step 4: Build Good Idea Habits

Hopefully, you’re now exposing yourself to new ideas, people, and activities, and you’ve got lists of things you enjoy and are good at. Now it’s time to start training your brain to become an idea-generating machine.

Start with good habits like meditation, writing down ideas (daily), etc.

Step 5: Put it all together

Okay, now it’s time to start connecting everything, literally. You can use your mind-mapping software, or pen and paper. You may want to write each idea on a separate card or get a big piece of poster board and scribble all over it. There’s no right or wrong as long as you put all your ideas where you can see them.