Research phases

idea_builder offers a set of research phases, each focused on one question about your market. You don’t need to run them all — start with the phases that answer your riskiest assumption.

Demand & trend phases

Trends (Google Trends)

Shows how interest in your topic is moving over time — whether searches are rising, flat, or falling, and which related queries people pair with your keywords. Use it first, to sanity-check that demand exists and to spot seasonal patterns before you commit.

Hacker News analysis

Reads the Hacker News community for discussion of your topic: story engagement, sentiment, and the domains people share. Use it to understand how the technical/builder community talks about the problem and to surface early complaints and feature requests.

Product Hunt analysis

Looks at comparable products launched on Product Hunt — upvotes, comments, and tags. Use it to gauge how a similar launch would land, which features the community rewarded, and what positioning resonated.

SEO & keyword research

Discovers the keywords people actually search, their volumes, and the competition for ranking on them. Use it to validate search demand, plan content, and estimate how hard organic acquisition will be.

Market sizing (TAM/SAM/SOM)

Estimates the total addressable market, the serviceable market you can reach, and the serviceable obtainable market you could realistically capture — with the reasoning spelled out. Use it to decide whether the prize is big enough to chase.

Audience & community phases

Reddit community mining

Digs into Reddit communities around your topic to find how people describe their problems, what solutions they try, and the language they use. Use it to build an audience profile and collect authentic pain-point quotes for your positioning.

Audience intel

Aggregates what you know about your target segments into a unified view — who they are, what pains they have, and what triggers adoption. Use it once you have some data, to sharpen your persona and message.

Competitive phases

Competitor analysis

Identifies the competitive landscape: who the players are, how they position, their strengths and weaknesses, and the moat of each. Use it to find gaps, threats, and your own differentiation.

Keyword gaps

Compares the keywords your competitors rank for against the ones you could target. Use it to find underserved search demand and content angles your competitors missed.

Ad intel

Reviews the advertising angle of your competitors — what claims they make and what creatives they run. Use it to learn what messaging they believe converts, and where you can out-position them.

Red-team analysis

Attacks your own idea: a structured adversarial review that looks for survivability issues, weak assumptions, and market risks — with concrete, testable mitigations. Use it before making a big commitment, to find the holes in your logic while they’re still cheap to fix.

Positioning map

Plots your idea and its competitors on a two-axis map (for example, price versus features). Use it to see at a glance where the white space is and where you’d be fighting head-on.

Which phases should I run first?

A pragmatic starting sequence:

Trends — is there demand and is it growing?
Market sizing — is the prize big enough?
Competitor analysis — who else is in the ring?
Red-team analysis — where is my idea weakest?

Run those four, then follow up with the phase that targets whatever question is still unanswered — community validation, keywords, ads, or positioning.

See running & scheduling research for how to start a run, or use AI research agents for a custom multi-step investigation.

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