Should you trademark your business idea?
Probably not. Trademarks cover names and logos, not ideas. Validate it, build it, and protect the name once it is worth something.
Dexter Todd
Co-founder & CPO at Draper
Co-founder and chief product/operating officer of Draper. Interested in all things product, design and brand. Previously at Bardar and Talentsheet.
10 articles
What kind of website do I need to test a business idea?
One page, one promise, a price and an email field. Build it in a day — the longer you spend on the page, the less able you are to hear the answer it gives you.
How do I run ads to test a business idea?
An ad test asks three questions in a row: can you reach your market, do they respond to your description, and will they give you an email. It answers no far better than yes.
How do I design a brand for a new business idea?
You don't invent a brand. You assemble one from references — and the useful ones come from what your customer already loves elsewhere, not from the competitors sitting next to you.
How do I know if my target market is actually real?
A market is real when the people in it already gather somewhere, describe the problem unprompted, and share words for it. Here is how to check, in an afternoon, for nothing.
What if my business idea already exists?
Finding competitors is the good result — it proves people pay for this. What you need is an angle, and it lives in the gap between what everyone competes on and what customers complain about.
How do I decide on a business idea?
You're not choosing an answer, you're choosing a question to go and ask. Pick the idea you could be proved wrong about soonest, and hold the problem rather than the product.
What tools can I use to validate a business idea?
All of it can be done by hand for nothing. What you are buying is time — so the question isn't about which tool is best, but which part of the job you want to stop doing yourself.
How do solo founders find their first 100 customers in 2026?
A seven-step process: list the rooms your customers already gather in, rate your standing in each, and work through them in that order — then buy traffic to go faster once you know what to say.
How do I validate demand for a startup idea before I build it?
Put one specific promise on a page with a price, buy a few hundred dollars of traffic, and judge the result against your own economics. A week is enough to get an answer.