There are many ways to validate your idea or gain traction before developing a product. Here’s one of Eric favorite examples. 

Katrina Lake founded a company called Stitch Fix. You explain your tastes in clothing, then they send you personalized items based on your preferences.

Stitch Fix is now a huge public company. But Katrina started with a super simple version of the product. 

She created a simple form to see whether people would buy clothes that were customized to their specific tastes. 

Once people filled out the form, Katrina and her team fulfilled each request. It was totally manual – no automation early on. Katrina kept this system until she hit almost $1 million in revenue, when she finally upgraded to better technology. 

We’re big believers in selling before you build.

It’s expensive and risky to spend too much time and money on development before validating your idea. 

Instead, start with no-code solutions like Bubble or Webflow to build an MVP. A lot of business ideas can use even simpler tools like Notion, Google Forms, or a basic landing page. 

And if you’re still looking for more inspiration, see how a reader of TFP validated his idea through Discord.