Ten Ways to Evaluate a Market
Score an opportunity across demand, economics, execution, and durability
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~days to results
- Steps
- 9
- Confidence
- 97%
Ten Ways to Evaluate a Market is a comparative scorecard for choosing among business opportunities. Start with urgency: customers who need a result now are easier to serve than those who merely find it interesting. Examine reachable market size and the price customers may pay. Subtract the likely cost of acquiring each customer and delivering the promised value. Then assess quality-of-life and strategic factors: whether the offer is distinctive, how quickly it can reach the market, whether an initial purchase can lead to valuable follow-on sales, and whether the asset can remain relevant without continuous reinvestment. The scorecard does not make every dimension equally important or produce certainty. Its value is forcing the founder to expose trade-offs and compare complete opportunity profiles rather than favouring one attractive feature.
Origin
Josh Kaufman describes the market-evaluation factors from The Personal MBA after first establishing the Five Parts of Every Business.
Core principles
- 01Urgent demand reduces sales friction
- 02Market size and price constrain revenue potential
- 03Acquisition and delivery costs determine economic quality
- 04Uniqueness and speed affect the founder's practical advantage
- 05Upsells and evergreen relevance compound customer and product value
How to run it
- 1
Measure urgency
Determine how quickly customers seek the result and how much hesitation surrounds the purchase. Look for costly consequences of delay.
Pro tip Use observed buying speed and deadlines rather than adjectives such as interested.
Watch out Praise without urgency can conceal apathy.
- 2
Bound demand and price
Estimate the number of reachable buyers and the price range the market can support. Consider whether a small market can still work through high contract value.
Pro tip Use reachable buyers, not the population of an entire industry.
Watch out A huge theoretical market may be commercially inaccessible.
- 3
Estimate acquisition economics
Calculate the effort and spending needed to earn one customer. Include marketing and sales activity, not only advertising.
Pro tip Use a conservative range until real conversion data exists.
Watch out Cheap delivery cannot rescue acquisition costs that exceed customer value.
- 4
Estimate delivery economics
Calculate the marginal time, labour, materials, support, and infrastructure required to fulfil each sale. Compare that cost with price.
Pro tip Model what happens at ten times the first month's customers.
Watch out Founder labour is still a delivery cost even when unpaid.
- 5
Assess uniqueness
Identify what the founder or offer can provide that customers cannot easily replace. Distinguish genuine advantage from superficial differentiation.
Pro tip Look for trusted access, expertise, assets, or a distinctive experience.
Watch out Uniqueness without customer value is decoration.
- 6
Assess speed
Estimate the time until a real customer can buy and receive value. Prefer opportunities that create reliable learning sooner when other factors are comparable.
Pro tip Measure time to a paid test, not time to the final vision.
Watch out Long development increases both capital and demand risk.
- 7
Map follow-on value
Identify useful purchases that may follow the initial transaction. Estimate lifetime value without assuming every buyer will upgrade.
Pro tip Make the first purchase valuable on its own.
Watch out An unprofitable front end needs evidence of repeat buying before it is safe.
- 8
Judge evergreen potential
Ask how long the offer remains relevant and what maintenance it requires. Compare assets that keep selling with offers that need constant reinvestment.
Pro tip Separate optional improvements from mandatory maintenance.
Watch out Evergreen does not mean maintenance-free or permanently demanded.
- 9
Compare complete profiles
Place the opportunities side by side and choose the strongest overall trade-off for the founder. Record the evidence and the most uncertain assumption.
Pro tip A weaker market may still win if it is faster, cheaper, and better matched to the founder.
Watch out Do not let one spectacular score hide several fatal weaknesses.
In the wild
A founder compares a compliance dashboard with a manual compliance review. The dashboard has greater scale and evergreen potential but needs months of development. The review can sell within a week, has higher delivery cost, and provides direct customer evidence. The scorecard makes the service the better first test while preserving software as a later option.
→ The founder chooses faster validated learning over a larger but less certain opportunity.
Common mistakes
Scoring from imagination
Unsupported numbers create the appearance of analysis without reducing uncertainty.
Optimizing only market size
A large market can still fail through weak urgency, expensive acquisition, or poor delivery economics.
Ignoring maintenance
A product that quickly becomes obsolete may require more ongoing investment than its revenue justifies.
Is it for you?
Best for
It is best for ranking business ideas after each idea has a clear five-part business model.
Not ideal for
It is not ideal when the founder lacks enough customer and cost evidence to score the factors honestly.
From the transcript
“the place i always start is is urgency”
“an ideal business is there's a huge market i can sell for an enormous amount of money it costs me almost nothing to get a…”
“what are the things that i could invest time attention money and energy into now that are going to be just as relevant 10 years…”
From the episode
Josh Kaufman: Launching a Business or Side Hustle
Josh Kaufman