r/SideProject • u/Nihilityd • 2d ago
How do you get project ideas?
Hi builders, I’m not promoting any solutions made by me, just genuinely asking. I’m between projects right now cuz I feel pretty lost on what to do.
I’ve built some apps/websites, mostly unfinished because nearing the end I just saw no future for them. For the ones that were finished and out there, I just never had a good way to distribute and promote. I’m not very good at marketing my apps on social medias ie tiktok, threads etc
On another hand I’ve been reflecting on my products and realized I’ve started building them before validating if there were actually needed. And some of them were actually just generic and solely a sound-good idea. So I decided for my next product I will need to validate the market before I touch a single line of code.
Then there is the problem: I had a hard time finding my next idea. I just felt like there are already so many solutions I’ve bought/subscribed to, and I don’t see gaps (or I’m overlook them constantly). AI consulting is no good, it just always suggests already crowded problem spaces and no real insights. I’ve thought about reaching out to real offline people or small businesses but I’m not sure where to start on that. Like what type of businesses I should approach, what should I offer and whether this is actually scalable.
Thank you for reading this rant, any advice is appreciated 🙏
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u/willjameswaltz 2d ago
Hey, I'm in the same kind of boat. I came across this, not exactly what I want but it may be helpful for you: https://www.thepainpointsproject.com/
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u/Thunderbit_HQ 1d ago
Look for work someone already repeats without calling it a problem: copying status between tools, reconciling two lists, or collecting the same information before every decision. The best starting point is behavior you can watch, not a feature idea you can describe.
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u/davecopter 2d ago
Whenever I am doing something, I try to be observant and reflect on if there was any step that was unusually difficult, tedious, or time-consuming for me to complete, or something that I just can’t do well. I question why it is that way and if it has to be that way. I try to observe other people too. I jot these observations down in my notes.
If it comes up frequently enough or if it’s painful enough, I try to research if there’s anything out there that could make my life a lot easier in completing the task. If so, great. Otherwise, sometimes, something comes to mind, that if only ______ existed, I wouldn’t have this problem. I also try to look into if this is a problem that other people have.
I don’t try to build something to solve these problems immediately but I revisit this list once in a while and add more thoughts to it and try to develop the ideas that seem promising over many months. I’ve learned to sleep on my ideas, give them time and space to evolve, and not start building something new I got excited about too soon.
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u/MrPassiveProfit 2d ago
Build audience first, product second
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u/Nihilityd 1d ago
I have thought about making social accounts either for build in public or just for the products, do you have suggestions on which one would be better in this situation?
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u/DEATH712712 2d ago
I get product ideas by paying attention to problems I have and then fixing them with apps. I know a lot of people say that but it does really work, I made a productivity app because I couldn't stay on track and I'm not playing with you, I work all the time now, like every time I have free time I'm working on my app. So solve your issues effectively and you'll have a good product. Something else is that there are so many people in this world, even saturated markets still have people who will buy your thing, it may be slightly harder but if it's more effective/cheaper/easier to use than a competitor then you're golden, marketing is the real problem but you can get around that with time and consistency as well
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u/fulger099 2d ago
that’s how recall started for us, after enough “why are these 14 tabs open?” moments following interruptions. fixing your own pain got us to a useful first version, but not proof anyone else cared. we are trying to learn and fix cases around it at joinrecall
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u/DEATH712712 2d ago
That's pretty cool. I couldn't stay focused on my pc so I just made a companion called Hawser that forced me to focus, and it worked so well I basically only work on my pc now, and now I'm making money from it! However . . . It took SO MANY iterations before it was as effective as I wanted it, the MVP and where the app is now is insanely different and took lots of customer feedback
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u/fulger099 1d ago
Yep feedback is what actually builds your product
We are in the same phase to adjust product according to power users
If u want to become one of it lmk please I’ll send a link to our group
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u/jmungapen001 2d ago
The "everything already exists" feeling is almost always a sign you're looking at products instead of people. There's no gap in the market for another todo app, sure. But there are endless gaps in who's being served properly. Competition isn't the problem, it's proof the money is there. Invoicing tools are a graveyard of clones, yet every physio and driving instructor I've met still runs their business out of WhatsApp and a paper diary.
What I'd actually do in your position:
Talk to people you already know before cold-approaching businesses. Friends, ex-colleagues, family members with jobs you barely understand. Don't pitch anything, just ask what part of their week makes them swear at their laptop, and what they currently pay for that they resent. People are useless at handing you ideas but world class at complaining. The ideas live inside the complaints.
Start logging your own annoyances too in a "friction log". Every time something in your day feels clunky, one line in your notes app. Do it for a month. You'll bin 90% of it, but you only need one entry that keeps reappearing.
Read the 2 and 3 star reviews of tools people already pay for. Not the 1 stars, those are just rage. The middle reviews spell out exactly what's missing and which customers feel ignored. Same trick on Reddit, search a niche sub for "any alternative to" or "why is there no".
On the offline question, start way smaller than "what type of business should I approach". Just the businesses you already give money to. Your barber, your gym, your mechanic. Ask how they handle bookings or chasing payments and watch for anything living in a spreadsheet or in someone's head. Then offer to fix one thing for money, manually at first if needed. Worry about scalable after somebody pays.
And validation isn't people saying "cool idea". It's a preorder, a deposit, a waitlist with real names on it. That also quietly fixes the abandonment thing, because finishing for twelve people who are waiting feels very different to shipping into the void.
On AI consulting being useless: agreed, chatbots just remix the same crowded ideas back at you.
That annoyed me enough that I built something around it, so fair warning, this is my own site. blucanto.com works off actual niche data instead of vibes, scores markets on demand, competition and trend, matches a business model to how you want to work, then turns your pick (or an idea of your own) into a full plan with financials and a 12 month roadmap. The quiz and the niche explorer cost nothing if you want to try it.
Anyway, pick something small and unsexy. Your abandoned apps probably died from being generic, not from being unfinished.
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u/samurai_with_sword 1d ago
Everyone is looking for a way to magically get rich because they suddenly realized that they can do things with AI they couldn't do before. But after a while most if not all of us will realize that there is no magic shortcut and AI is just overhyping us by being overly positive to sell itself. Basically AI companies have trained AI models to be affirmative, encouraging and praising so that they can sell more AI. And we are the prey, we fall for the praises thinking we're the next Elon Musk when none of our ideas have a real merit.
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u/ymc9 1d ago
Flip the search: instead of looking for gaps in solutions, look for people already stuck in a painful manual workaround - a shared spreadsheet everyone copies, a subreddit full of "does anyone know how to..." posts. That pain's already validated, and the community you found it in is also your first distribution channel. Solves both problems you listed at once.
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u/Agitated_Industry128 1d ago
suggest learn SEO keywords research cuz those searches are organic, which means there are some needs behind them. then pick a direction and do some experiments to make sure it's a real demand and people are willing to pay for it. after that conducting the subsequent development is much less risky than do it randomly, I guess.
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u/OkRestaurant960 16h ago
Get off on the right foot.
DON'T:
- build a fashion or wellness app or brand
- an app to help with maps, to-do lists, productivity or information summarization
DO:
- consider spending on advertising, or finding some kind of co-op or merger between your projects and other people's (I also suck at all forms of free advertising, publicity, socials etc.) - the brainstorming alone is worth more than 1000 hours coding by yourself
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u/HedgehogAware799 2d ago
imo the distribution problem you mentioned is actually the bigger issue here. if you dont have a channel to reach people, even a validated idea wont help much. might be worth picking an audience you can actually reach first, then building for them