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Don’t make the mistake of assuming your idea for a new product or service is needed in the … [+]<\/span> marketplace.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/fbs-accordion>getty<\/small><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n The biggest mistake people make with their intellectual property has nothing to do with protection. It\u2019s not knowing whether anyone else is going to benefit from their brilliant idea. It\u2019s not knowing whether there is demand <\/em>for it in the marketplace.<\/p>\n A lot of us get ahead of ourselves. We file non-provisional patent<\/a> applications, build expensive prototypes, raise money, and start businesses \u2014 and then, after all that, find out whether anyone really wants our product. This process is extremely expensive, time-consuming, and, when our assumptions are wrong, painful.<\/p>\n The risk of spending a lot of time and money on an idea that no one wants exists at every level of the innovation ecosystem, including inventors, startups, small businesses, and corporates. For example, the U.S. National Science Foundation awards over $200 million each year to advance the development of new ideas through its Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs<\/a>. The startup companies are funded to do technical research, which is inherently risky \u2014 but it\u2019s more often the market-based risks that cause them to fail.<\/p>\n \u201cThe biggest risk is that they build something that no one actually cares about,\u201d stressed program director Ben Schrag during an Inventors Groups of America meeting<\/a>.<\/p>\n When deciding which startups and small businesses to award, the NSF considers how common market-based risks are being managed, and provides training to all awardees on how to better understand their market and customers. NSF also launched a program in 2011, Innovation Corps or I-Corps<\/a>, that\u2019s devoted to teaching researchers how to test the market before starting a business.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is so that [the company] doesn\u2019t spend a bunch of money on R&D to reduce the technical risk, and then realize too late that it was actually a different issue \u2013 lack of a customer pain point \u2013 that was the most important threat the whole time,\u201d Schrag said.<\/p>\n There is a simple solution! You need to test the market to determine whether anyone truly wants your imagined product or service first<\/em>. Is the benefit of your product or service great enough for potential customers to actually purchase it?<\/p>\n There are many benefits to testing for market demand. You can leverage market demand to get other parties to come to the table. It gives you a paper trail of protection. In my experience, potential licensees are less likely to try to work around you when you have evidence of market demand. You can file better intellectual property based on the input you receive by aligning your patent claims with your business objectives.<\/p>\n You must account for the risk that you\u2019re developing an idea that no one wants before spending a lot of time and money. That\u2019s the big benefit of the strategy outline below. It\u2019s an effective way of testing the benefit of your idea before building and protecting it. It allows you to refine or redesign your product, and protect it accordingly, based on the input you receive. Ultimately, it helps you move forward in the right direction by providing critically useful information.<\/p>\n Let the market help you determine when to file a non-provisional patent application.<\/p>\n Here is a simple four-step process inventors and startups can rely on.<\/p>\nTest the Market For Your Invention Idea in 4 Steps<\/h2>\n