Market Analysis for Innovation Opportunities

📊 How big is the problem you’re solving? That question isn’t just for startups pitching investors. It’s a strategic essential for anyone building products, entering markets, or prioritizing innovation. That’s where the TAM / SAM / SOM Canvas comes in. It helps you map the real size of the customer problem—so you can focus your efforts where it matters most. 💡 A quick breakdown: TAM = Total Addressable Market → If every potential customer in the world had this problem and picked your solution. SAM = Serviceable Available Market → The segment you can realistically reach given geography, channels, and regulation. SOM = Serviceable Obtainable Market → Your near-term focus. What you can actually win based on current capabilities and traction. 🧭 How to use the canvas: - Start with the problem—not your product. Ask: How many people/companies face this problem deeply enough to want to solve it? - Segment smart. Don’t assume one-size-fits-all. Define key customer groups and their willingness to pay or switch. - Run real numbers. Use public market data, industry reports, interviews, and behavioral proxies (e.g. search volume, churn, waitlists). - Map the layers visually. The canvas helps teams align on ambition vs. realism—and avoid inflated market myths. 🤔 Why this matters for more than startups: Startups → Validate if the market is big enough to build a business. Scale-ups → Prioritize where to double down or expand next. Corporates → Justify resource allocation and de-risk innovation bets with market logic in your business model portfolio. This tool is especially helpful when entering new domains or assessing bold bets. It turns abstract potential into concrete direction. 🛠 Want to use the TAM/SAM/SOM Canvas for your product, venture, or innovation case? Happy to share a template or walk you through it. Let’s build what matters—at the right scale. #BusinessDesign #TAMSAMSOM #CustomerProblem #InnovationStrategy #GrowthMakers #ProductStrategy #MarketSizing #DesignThinking #CreateTheWow

If you’re: • Entering a new market with an existing service • Launching a new offering • Capturing market share during times of disruption Here are the 3 lenses I review with clients in order to make strategic decisions on where to invest time, energy, personnel and money to grow their company Lens 1: Historical Context & Qualification Here’s what to look for:  • What measurable, fact only (no opinion) data points can validate this opportunity’s viability? • Does the new market fit your criteria (and align with your capabilities)? • What’s the risk vs. upside and how do we quantify both? This can help you easily eliminate bad ideas you thought were opportunities. Lens 2: The Future Since no one can predict the future, you have to go further than just reviewing market trends and forecast reports (which are valuable in themselves) Here you must identify first, second and third order consequences of what might potentially happen. As you review each potential consequence, you have to process how that may affect you. A simple way to do this is by asking “if this were true, how would this affect X” Since we’re dealing with hypotheticals, we’ll tie this thinking to Lens 3 to keep it grounded. Lens 3: Unchanging Principles Principles are laws or foundational blocks that never change regardless of the situation. For example, the law of gravity does not change over time or space (or even if you believe it may not exist, it will still work!) Your job here is to identify what principles are at play with  • your market • your offering • the opportunity you’re looking to enter into  • the external forces at play (macro economic, social, consumer behavior) Once you’ve identified the principles at play, you use them to anchor your thinking from lens 1 & 2 back to reality and create working hypothesis. Then all that’s left is to make your move, measure, optimize etc. 

Decoding the Language of Innovation: Part 5 Every week, I decode one innovation concept/term through a Jobs-to-be-Done lens. The goal is to align your organization around a common language of innovation; one that will enhance its value creation efforts. This week's concept/term is: "Market Selection" Let's get into it. Since selecting markets is about deciding where to create new revenue streams, it follows that effective market selection requires evaluating opportunities through two key lenses: 1. How attractive is the market? (size, growth, frequency of job execution) 2. How well can we serve it? (capabilities, technology fit, competitive advantage) For example, if you're considering entering the market of "helping parents pass on life lessons to children," you would evaluate: - How many parents need this job done - How frequently do they need to do it - How dissatisfied they are with current solutions - How well your capabilities align with helping them Why it matters: When selecting markets, you should start by asking "what job needs to get done better?" Traditional market selection often focuses solely on current product sales, leading companies to enter crowded markets where they have no meaningful advantage. Using a Jobs-to-be-Done lens, you can be certain you are selecting markets where there's both an opportunity to create value and an ability to capture that value. This means looking for markets where: - The job is important and frequently executed - Current solutions don't get the job done well - Your company has the capabilities to help get the job done better - Customers are willing to pay for better solutions Using this approach will help your business: - Focus resources on the most promising opportunities - Enter markets where you can create meaningful value - Avoid wasteful competition in overcrowded markets - Build sustainable competitive advantages See you next Friday for the next edition of Decoding the Language of Innovation! — Thanks for reading! This was part 5 of my weekly series: Decoding the Language of Innovation. Where every Friday, I decode one innovation concept/term by looking at it through a Jobs-to-be-Done lens. With a common language of innovation, your company can: - Align in the same direction - and the right direction - Make better products - Grow revenue - And beat the competition Follow me here - @tonyulwick - to get my post in your feed every Friday.