The most expensive mistake in bootstrapping is building something nobody wants. Validation is the cheap way to find out before you spend three months coding. You don't need a product to validate. You need conversations and a signal that someone will actually pay.
1. Talk to people the right way
Read The Mom Test by Rob Fitzpatrick. The core idea: ask about their past behaviour and real problems, never about your idea. People lie to be nice when you pitch them. They tell the truth when you ask about their life.
- Good: "Walk me through the last time you dealt with this."
- Good: "What have you already tried, and what did it cost you?"
- Weak: "Would you use a tool that does this?" Everyone says yes, so the answer tells you nothing.
2. Look for signals of real pain
You are hunting for problems people already spend time or money trying to solve. Hacky spreadsheets, manual workarounds, an existing tool they openly hate. Those are the gold. "That would be nice" is not.
3. Get a commitment, not a compliment
Compliments are noise. Fitzpatrick's test for real interest is whether someone gives up something scarce: money (a pre-order or a deposit), reputation (an intro to their boss), or time (a recurring call on the calendar). A landing page with a real "buy" or "join the waitlist" button measures intent far better than any survey.
4. Build the smallest possible test
A one-page Carrd site, a Stripe payment link, or a concierge service you run by hand behind the scenes. Charge real money as early as you can, because paid pilots teach you more than free trials ever will. Pieter Levels ran Nomad List as a public, crowdsourced Google spreadsheet before it was ever software, and let demand decide whether the real thing was worth building.
Rule of thumb: if you can't get five people to say "tell me the moment it's ready" and mean it, you don't have validation yet. You have an idea you happen to like.