[softwaredoug]

It’s hard to find problems without hands on experience in a problem space.

Then what you’ll see is there are A LOT of snake oil salesman (just pour some AI on it). There is also just a lot of bad quality/ limitations in almost all products. Solving practical, sometimes boring, problems, in a way that actually consistently delights users, is actually by far the exception.

Only by learning the domain, and trying to solve it, ideally with yourself as the main user, can you cut through all the BS and noise.

In other words care more about a domain first, be of service to people in that domain, try to solve problems with existing tools. You’ll see there gaps. The real problems/products will fall out naturally.

[ozim]

That and also having connections in business area.

From what I have seen in startup I worked for we most likely did not get a customer that my boss did not work with earlier.

Other ones were most likely choosing competition based on who they knew and worked with earlier.

Mind you we still had to go through due diligence before they signed, but getting foot in the door by knowing someone who can propose us as a vendor was big help.