The mate who said it would never work.

Getting Started · 5 min read

Almost every client has this story. They were excited about their app idea. They told a mate, a colleague, a family member. And they got shot down. "That already exists." "Nobody would pay for that." "Why would someone use an app when they can just Google it?"

It stings. You've been thinking about this for months, maybe years. You've done the research. You know the problem. And someone who spent thirty seconds hearing about it just told you it's a waste of time.

So let me be clear. That feedback says more about them than it does about your idea.

They're not your user

The person saying "that'll never work" probably doesn't work in your industry. They don't have the problem your app solves. They've never experienced the frustration of the current workaround. They're imagining whether they would use it, and of course they wouldn't. It's not built for them.

If you told a desk worker that tradies would pay for a certification prep app, they'd look at you blankly. They don't sit exams to keep their licence. They've never failed a renewal assessment. The entire problem is invisible to them. So when they say "nobody would pay for that," what they really mean is "I wouldn't pay for that." And their opinion, while well-intentioned, is irrelevant to your market.

The only feedback that matters comes from people who actually have the problem. If ten people in your target industry say "I'd pay for that," that outweighs a hundred mates who say "nah, wouldn't work."

Loss aversion is doing the talking

There's a psychological reason your mate shut the idea down, and it has nothing to do with market analysis. Kahneman and Tversky's prospect theory, published in Econometrica in 1979, showed that people weigh potential losses about twice as heavily as equivalent gains. When your mate hears "I'm going to spend money building an app," their brain immediately goes to the risk. What if it fails? What if you lose the money? What if it doesn't work?

They're not evaluating your idea rationally. They're instinctively trying to protect you from loss. That's not market research. That's loss aversion wearing the mask of advice. And it feels authoritative because it comes from someone you trust. But trust doesn't make someone qualified to evaluate a market they don't understand.

That doesn't make them a bad friend. It makes them a bad focus group. They're responding emotionally to the idea of risk, not analytically to the viability of the product. Those are very different things.

Filter the noise, keep the signal

I'm not saying ignore all negative feedback. Some of it is useful. If someone in your target market says "I wouldn't use this because the existing solution already handles it well," that's worth investigating. If a potential user says "the price is too high for what it does," that's actionable. Feedback from people who understand the problem can sharpen your thinking and save you from blind spots.

But feedback from people outside your market, people who don't have the problem, don't work in the industry, and spent less than a minute thinking about it? File it under "nice of them to care" and move on. Your job isn't to convince your mate. Your job is to build something that solves a real problem for real people who are willing to pay for it.

And when the app launches and works and people are paying for it, that mate will probably say "I always thought it was a great idea." That's fine too.

Sources
Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision under Risk (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979, Econometrica) - People weigh potential losses roughly twice as heavily as equivalent gains. Negative feedback from non-users is often loss aversion, not market insight.

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