Podcast Transcription Service
Researched a monitoring and guest-placement product. Concluded it wasn't differentiable.
Hypothesis
Working as a marketer, you know that channels are key. You also know that channel saturation is a real thing, and signal-to-noise ratio is essential. One of the fastest-growing media channels is podcasting. As a marketer, the challenge is that there are so many podcasts, covering so many topics, that it’s impossible to stay on top of what’s going on. Sure, the main ones are easy to know. But those are also extremely hard to be a guest on. It’s the long tail that can deliver opportunities. So I had this idea… if I:
- create a database of podcasts — not super easy, but doable
- get the transcripts for each new episode — doable
- use AI to process the transcript and understand who the guests are, what topics are being discussed, which products/software are being mentioned
then it might be useful for marketers trying to promote their SaaS and CEOs. And the cherry on top is that this system is language agnostic. My first step, whenever I have an idea, is to search for commercial viability. Or, in the words of Rod Tidwell, “SHOW ME THE MONEY!” So that’s where I focused first.
Research findings
I came to realize that there are already several players in this space, doing either this, a version of this, or something that is adjacent enough to this to make me question if the effort was worthwhile.
Decision
Having existing players validates the idea. So, I’m not looking for an idea that no one came up with before. Having said that, it is important to understand if you are able to bring something to the table that is simultaneously sufficiently different and sufficiently valuable. If not, then differentiation and positioning will be harder, which in turn makes acquisition harder. Spoiler alert, I stopped. The remaining opportunity was operational execution against incumbents with a head start, not technical innovation — and a week of research answered that instead of six months of building.