Stopped Brainstorming Startup Ideas 3 Months Ago. Started Reading Complaints Instead. Here's What Changed.

used to spend hours coming up with ideas in my head

then researching for days

then finding 20 competitors

then getting discouraged

repeat for 4 months straight

the shift that broke the cycle was embarrassingly simple

i stopped looking for ideas and started looking for anger

not "wouldn't it be cool if" posts

actual frustrated humans writing paragraphs about time they're wasting every week on broken workflows

the difference is massive

when you start with someone's frustration you skip the hardest part of building a business. you don't have to guess if anyone wants it. they already told you. publicly. in their own words.

one pattern that keeps showing up in the data: the problems people complain about most passionately are almost never in "sexy" categories. it's always stuff like compliance documentation, cross-border invoicing, niche scheduling tools for specific trades.

nobody wants to build these. which is exactly why they're opportunities.

meanwhile the "cool" categories like ai writing tools and habit trackers have hundreds of builders fighting for the same users.

boring problems make rich founders. exciting problems make good twitter posts.

if you want to try this tonight: go to any subreddit related to your skills. search "i hate when" or "why doesn't this exist." read 50 posts. pay attention to ones where someone describes a specific workflow that wastes their time every week. that's your opportunity.

what's the most boring business you've seen actually print money?