Startup Idea Validation: Learning What People Really Think Using Real Feedback

If you've ever put a new product idea out into the world, whether it's a startup idea, a side project, or just a wild concept, you know the anxiety. Will people get it? Will they love it? Will they tear it apart? Or worse... will they say nothing at all?

 

We analyzed a massive dataset from over 90,000 product launches and more than 60,000 pages of user feedback to uncover what people actually say when reacting to new ideas. This isn't just about whether they'd use or buy something. It's about how real world feedback can help validate startup ideas and shape what comes next. If you're checking whether your product idea already exists, or looking for early feedback to validate your business idea, these insights might just change how you approach launching.
 

Most Ideas Get Ghosted. And that's normal.
 

Here's the first gut punch: Half of all launches don't get even a single comment. Not ten. Not five. Not. Even. One.

Even if you're around the top 25% mark, you're looking at four comments or less. That's your whole validation pool. Four internet strangers.
This tells us something big: the internet is not a focus group.

Most ideas don't trigger a strong enough reaction for people to care, and that's okay. The world is noisy, people are busy, and unless something really resonates (or pisses them off), they won't take the time to type. Only a handful of launches hit a sweet spot among people by either catching their imagination or hitting a widely shared market need. These can kickstart a conversation, and the number of comments can reach 50 or even much more. 

If you are a founder searching for signals, you may be wondering whether those extra comments are usually just fluff or low value noise. It seems like they aren't. In fact, the signal-to-noise ratio tends to stay consistent, even in high engagement launches. So if you do get traction, it's likely meaningful. 
 

"I'd Buy This" Is Incredibly Rare

 

A common trap in startup idea validation is mistaking interest for intent. 

Here's the brutal truth. People will tell you they'd use something way more often than they'd pay for it. Let's underpin this notion with some numbers based on what we have found.

You might see as much as one third or more of the commenters say, "I'd use this" in about 2 out of 10 product launches. (Yes, there are examples where pretty much everyone says they would use the product.) This datapoint doesn't sound that bad. People are generally curious about new stuff, and are keen to make their own life more productive, comfortable or entertaining. So when you introduce them to a new product you've built, getting a "when can I try this?" is easy enough.

This type of engagement does not necessarily age well of course when founders are trying to create and sustain a business. Every successful founder knows that they need to look beyond enthusiasm to real buying intent, so the number one question creators want answered is "would you pay for this?". 

As it turns out, getting such a signal is extremely rare. 95% of the launches will never get any of this type of verbal commitment at all. A launch would need to be in the top 5 percentile even to have one person saying "I'd spend money on this". This is an insane gap between use and buy signals, and this highlights two key truths:

• It perfectly illustrates the classic startup trap: interest ≠ revenue.
• With most potential customers, building trust and establishing a relationship with your brand comes first.

The main takeaway here is that if you get any amount of buy signal when launching your product, you are already doing better than most.

 

Negativity Is Rare. Until It Explodes

 

One of the biggest surprises in the data? People aren't as negative as you'd expect.

We thought we would see more or less an equal amount of "I'd use this" vs "I don't need this in my life" in the dataset, or perhaps a slight tilt towards positive feedback. 

What we saw, however, is that products with negative feedback are actually hard to come by. At the 90th percentile, the rate of people explicitly saying "I wouldn't use this" is still… 0%. That's right, zero. Even for fairly successful launches, most people either like the idea, ignore it, or just don't engage. 

There is a caveat though. When negativity does show up, it hits hard. 

• At the 99th percentile, 50% of comments reject using the product. 38% explicitly say they wouldn't buy it.

This creates a weird but quite important dynamic: most ideas don't get strong rejection - until they do, at scale. So while early negative feedback is rare, and shouldn't scare you, repeated rejections across different audiences could be a valid signal that something might be off. Use it as a prompt to refine your idea.
 

What This Means for Early-Stage Founders

Based on all these insights there are three main takeaways if you're working on something new or trying to validate startup ideas online:

 

1. Don't mistake silence for failure. Most ideas don't get attention. Not because they're bad, but because people are busy, and won't respond to new ideas unless they're truly moved. If you're getting zero feedback, find a better way to reach the right audience. If you get any engagement, you're ahead of most launches.
2. Beware the "I'd use it" trap. People love free stuff and gathering interest in trying out something new is easy. But if you're not hearing "I'd pay for this," your idea might not be a business, it might just be a cool concept.
3. Negativity is a late-game boss. Rejection is rare early on, but if it starts to appear consistently, take a step back. Is it because your idea is controversial? Ahead of its time? Or is there a deeper flaw? It could point to a core misalignment with your target market.

The hardest part of launching isn't just getting an idea off the ground - it's making sense of what happens next. Is it early traction or just noise? A real opportunity or a dead end? If this data tells us anything, it's that signals from the market aren't always what they seem. And in the crucial idea validation stage, misreading them can mean the difference between doubling down on a winner or sinking time into something that was never going to take off.

 

Want To Validate Your Product Idea Instantly?

We were wondering these questions, because like so many early stage (and often failed) founders this type of data is impossible to come by. However, once we got the data (all 60,000 pages worth of comments, analyzed, in a system) we thought it'd be selfish not to let others use it.

So we created ShouldIBuild.it, to help founders get data-driven validation fast.

You enter an idea in plain English. Our tool searches a massive dataset of real launches and feedback to find similar products, and shows what happened when they launched. You'll see what kind of traction they got, how users responded, and what types of signals to look for. Plus, you get practical, actionable and personalized advice for your next steps.

Validate your idea now and see what the market might already be telling you.