Scoring New Business Ideas

flash harry

Hi all

I have a few business ideas i am looking into and have a dilemma as to which to pursue.

Has anyone seen any systems to score ideas to try decide which is best?

(I know this is quite a subjective area, but would use them as a guide with healthy dose of realism)

FH

honeymonster

Just off the top of my head I would consider the following:

Start up costs
Number of competitors
Type of market: consolidated or fragmented
Potential market size
Potential revenue from each customer
Barrier to entry or can you create one eg first mover advantage
How easy is it to copy your idea?
When I expect to see a return
Level of risk eg is has something similar been tried before and how well is it doing?
Type of cost that will have to be paid: fixed or variable?

Im sure theres loads more you can think of yourself

stepbar

flash harry wrote: »

Hi all

I have a few business ideas i am looking into and have a dilemma as to which to pursue.

Has anyone seen any systems to score ideas to try decide which is best?

(I know this is quite a subjective area, but would use them as a guide with healthy dose of realism)

FH

I would be inclined to score ideas (at a high level) along a number of well known business models such as Porters 5 Forces, SWOT, BCG matrix etc. At least it gives you a template for to critically evaluate your idea based on the marketplace. You could also try to score idea's along some sort of balanced scorecard system but I would feel that you'd be limiting your scope somewhat.

If your idea passes the test then perhaps then you can move to more accounting based specifics such as % margins, T/O, profit and go from there. As you've correctly said, a lot of this is subjective but at least if you've done the groundwork, it removes a lot of the uncertainty.

flash harry

thanks guys