Where's the Pain Point?

If the pain is obvious, front and center, and makes you cringe, you’ve found the point where it hurts. I just met with a fellow WordPress developer and we were talking about creating an all-in-one service for school/parent/teacher communication, news, calendar, etc. and he asked what my pain point was. It was immediate and it came from the gut, “I have to enter a new parent into four different databases and then she can’t even update her information after she’s set up. That hurts. Every time.” That’s pain. I don’t want a vitamin, I don’t want to feel better, I want a better solution. If you have one, I’d happily pay for it.

Does your solution relieve a true pain or is it just “good for you”?

Yesterday at Launch we heard from all kinds of start-ups, but the ones that stuck were the ones that struck a nerve. “Oooh, I need that!” For example, there was one that helped you remember names of people you met or maybe kinda knew, but you just couldn’t remember their names. Perfect app for a huge conference! In fact, their presentation started out with an image of the presenter who was just on stage 30 seconds before they were. They asked, “This guy was just on stage before us. Do you recognize him? Yes. Do you remember his name? No.” Their app helped you with images, social media, relevant searches and other voodoo but it really hit a sore spot for people: it’s hard to remember people’s names. The pain point was the embarrassment of not knowing someone’s name. It solved a problem clearly.

Another start-up presented their app that helped you sort out your evening of social events. It combined Eventbrite and MeetUp and Yelp and others to optimize your plans for the evening. Yeah, maybe I could see using that. Once. But it’s not addressing pain. Hey, maybe I’m just not their target market.

People are more willing to pay for aspirin than vitamins–especially in an emergency.

Ask yourself if your service or product or company addresses a pain point or is just a vitamin. Does it just make you feel better or does it relieve an immediate issue.