How do I know you won’t just take my idea and build it yourself (leaving me out of it)?

A valid concern, unless you’re actually in my business.

A typical day for me is as follows:

• Get to work by 8:30 AM
• Work for 8-12 hours for various clients – this is what I get paid for, so I have to work on projects that I’m being paid for or I won’t be able to pay my bills
• Get home, eat dinner, spend some time with my wife and daughter – this time is strictly family time, so no working on projects
• If I feel up to it, put in a couple hours on writing articles here and on my single pet project
• Sleep

First, there isn’t really any time for me to work on your idea unless you’re a client. I won’t get paid for it, so the only slot left for it is during my project time. I already have a project that I would like to complete, so even if I decided your idea was better than mine (and many times this is true), I would still want to finish my current project before starting another.

Second, there are all the reasons to keep you involved. You thought of the idea, and probably have some vision of how the entire project will work. Building an application is only part of it – you still need to define your target market, and reach out to them. I could spend time figuring out an angle, but you are likely far ahead of me in that direction. You also have likely thought of how the business will grow, something you haven’t told me about. So I can only guess in that direction.

Third, it’s not my business model – at all. I’m in the business of helping clients build their ideas into realities, not running those businesses for them. A perfect client to me is one who has a good idea, needs some help getting it off the ground, and plans on running the project themselves once it is built. Running an online business can be more than a full-time job, and it’s not what I’m interested in doing. That’s what my clients like doing, and I help them get the technology they need to make it happen.

Fourth, it’s really bad for business. If I took even one client’s idea and executed it on my own, word would quickly get out that I stole the idea. I would lose the trust of all my current and potential clients for a potential momentary gain. It’s not even a guarantee – no matter how good the idea is, there’s never any guarantee that it will be profitable.

Am I saying that an NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement) is unnecessary? No. You should still have one signed. But it’s not so much as to enable you to protect your idea as it is to inform the other party that you intend to execute the idea, and whatever you tell them about it should be considered proprietary.

Is it enforceable? Probably not, in most cases. But it does make it clear that you consider the information given to be privileged.

Related posts:

1. The Value of an Idea
2. I Have a Great Idea – What Now?
3. It’s a Good Idea, Now What?

How novel does a startup idea need to be?

There were several answers provided, and I obviously like my own the best:

Even if your idea is novel, within days of your site going live, there will be several imitators out there hawking a similar product. You have to do the best job you can to make your product provide as much value as possible. Thus, the issue of being novel is [almost] irrelevant, since even if it is novel today, it won’t be tomorrow, so why worry about that? Instead focus on being better than whatever competition is out there!

Thinking of a novel idea?

However, in looking at the question, there really is more that can be said about this. An idea for a startup needs a few components in order to be eligible for success, and novel is not one of them:

1. Is there an unfilled demand for this idea?
2. Who will pay for developing this idea?
3. Can I do this, or can I recruit someone who can?

Is the idea original? It doesn’t really matter if the demand is not being filled currently (question 1). If I can fill the demand (question 3), and someone will pay for it (question 2), then my idea has the potential to be a success. If any of these questions cannot be answered satisfactorily, then it may be a good idea for someone else, or it may not be a good idea at all.

As a hopeful startup founder, what you need to do is be aware of how unique your idea is, because it will help you pay attention to the appropriate competitors. If there aren’t any at the moment (which in general demonstrates that you haven’t done your research properly, but occasionally might be true), then as soon as you launch, find out who started right after you. There is not a single niche market for which there is no competition – and I challenge you, my readers, to show me an exception. No, the competition may not be exactly the same as you, and they may not be at the same level as you. But they exist.

If you can understand who your competition is, and how you and they differ from one another, then you’ll understand the being novel is not that important. What is important is to be as good as possible at whatever it is you do.

Related posts:

1. Clever idea… but are you the first?
2. Balance of Founders
3. Conception to Creation of a Business Idea