Use discussion in conjunction with other tools to help you determine if there is an opportunity.
Discussion is one of the most useful ways to find opportunities because it usually means you instantly have your first potential user! If you speak to someone and identify an opportunity they want addressed, then this person can become a great source of insight if you decide to pursue the opportunity. This is more useful than a social media thread as you can ask questions and engage with the person and really start to empathise with them to understand the opportunity. For this reason, discussion is a great tool to use in combination with any of the other tools because it helps you really make sure something is an opportunity before you spend too much time developing a response. If you really can’t find someone to have a discussion with who actually wants the opportunity addressed, then it’s highly probable that there isn’t actually an opportunity.
Discussion can be in a number of forms ranging from casual banter with the barista making your coffee, to asking a colleague to have a coffee to have a casual conversation on a specific topic, to organising an interview with someone in a certain field and using prepared questions to gather specific information. This means that the discussion tool can overlap with research, as interviews are also a great research technique.
ExampleConversation over coffee leads to Frank Body
A great example of finding an opportunity through discussion is Frank Body. Steve Rowley was a coffee shop owner and spoke regularly with customers. He found that multiple people he talked to were interested in natural beauty products that contain caffeine. In fact, some people specifically requested old coffee grounds to use for cosmetic purposes. This wasn’t really a product that they could buy anywhere.
Talking to his customers showed him there was a group of people interested in this product and that there was potentially an opportunity to create something to meet this need. Frank Body is now a well-known natural beauty brand stocked by major retailers worldwide with every product containing coffee in some form. Without those initial conversations, Frank Body would likely never have existed.
Discuss with purpose
Think of a problem you have experienced today. Try to have a discussion with at least three different people about this problem. Rather than asking questions that can only be responded to with yes, no or some form of definite answer, you should ask open-ended questions that start with what, why or how. You can also ask about their experience. For example, tell me about the last time you had a frustrating experience with public transport? Trying to delve into their experiences is more likely to give you valuable, meaningful information that you can use to understand their perspective.
