People are paying $1M for confidence in answering "what next?" Hot tip: don't.

Five years ago, I worked for a company where our client's paid $1M, waited 3 months, to get a 3 metre journey map of the future of their business.

They were works of art, beautifully designed, with over 50 hours of research dedicated to them.

The said irony is <1% of those ideas ever made it to market because they didn't have the confidence to take the next step.

My take away? A lot of companies believe that time and money are directly related to confidence:

> They spend months on "what-if" research, planning for every scenario.
> They create elaborate commercial and operating models for assurance.
> They hire a top 3 consulting firm (with a 7 figure price tag) for their expertise and advice.

Can I give you my 2 cents?

Most of this, is a waste early on.

The only way to de-risk your strategy, is to launch something that has a value exchange with a small number of consumers, see if they like it, and then worry about the rest.

Tangible proof eats strategy decks for breakfast.