Having a business idea and recognizing a business opportunity is the first step towards establishing a new venture. This Guide introduces the knowledge and resources that relate to how to identify business opportunities and develop business ideas.

The courses selected can be audited for free and you can find the audit instructions for Coursera and Edx courses.

The Search for Great Ideas: Harnessing creativity to empower innovation. | Coursera (Michigan State University)

Where do great business ideas come from? We all have compelling business concepts that we've been thinking about for years. In this course, we will explore how to use observational tools and other techniques for idea generation and we will talk about how to evaluate the good ideas from the bad. The goal is to settle on a business idea that you are not only passionate about but also has real market application. At the end of this course learners will be able to build a resource inventory from which they can assess and create market opportunities; pursue market opportunities consistent with personal passions and capabilities; and triage potential ideas in terms of which have the greatest potential for commercial and personal success.

Developing Innovative Ideas for New Companies: The First Step in Entrepreneurship (University of Maryland)

This course assists aspiring and active entrepreneurs in developing great ideas into great companies. You will learn how to: Identify and analyze entrepreneurial opportunities; Enhance your entrepreneurial mindset; Improve your strategic decision-making; and build innovative business models.

Innovation for Entrepreneurs: From Idea to Marketplace (University of Maryland)

Develop insights on navigating the innovation process from idea generation to commercialization. Key questions answered within the course include: What are the key indicators of innovation opportunities? What steps are critical for entrepreneurs to bring innovations to the marketplace? What innovation strategies are valuable for new ventures to establish and maintain a competitive advantage?

Entrepreneurship 1: Developing the Opportunity (The University of Pennsylvania)

This introductory course is designed to introduce you to the foundational concepts of entrepreneurship, including the definition of entrepreneurship, the profile of the entrepreneur, the difference between entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial management, and the role of venture creation in society.

You Can Innovate: User Innovation & Entrepreneurship (MIT)

This course will teach you to look at the world through the lens of problem discovery and problem-solving. You will explore problems that you see in your life and in the world and evaluate their potential for entrepreneurial innovation.

Startup Success: How to Launch a Technology Company in 6 Steps (MIT)

Serial Entrepreneurs Michael Stonebraker and Andy Palmer share their years of start-up experience in six (not so) easy steps.

How to Get Startup Ideas (Y Combinator)

YC Partner Jared Friedman shares advice on how to get startup ideas. This video was recorded for the future founder track in Startup School 2020.

Understanding the Jobs to Be Done Theory for Breakthrough Innovation (Startup Nation)

Watch co-authors Clayton Christensen, Taddy Hall and Karen Dillon discuss case studies from “Competing Against Luck,” explain the jobs theory and more.

Know Your Customers’ “Jobs to Be Done” (Harvard Business Review)

According to Christensen and his coauthors, product developers focus too much on building customer profiles and looking for correlations in data. To create offerings that people truly want to buy, firms instead need to home in on the job the customer is trying to get done.

Testing Business Ideas with David Bland (Strategyzer)

David Bland explains how systematically testing business ideas can dramatically reduce the risk and increase the likelihood of success for any new venture or business project.

The Basics of Testing Business Ideas (Strategyzer)

Strategyzer co-founder Alex Osterwalder wants to share some crucial basics to testing. This session includes important elements like how to select the best hypothesis, how to design experiments, how to run them, and how to learn from them.

Start Testing B2B Ideas (Strategyzer)

David Bland and Alex Osterwalder, authors of the book Testing Business Ideas, walk you through testing business ideas in B2B. Zapier and Health Catalyst join them to share their insights “from B2B testing in the field”.

How I Built This with Guy Raz (NPR)

Guy Raz dives into the stories behind some of the world's best known companies. How I Built This weaves a narrative journey about innovators, entrepreneurs and idealists—and the movements they built.

StartUp USA

A public television show that interviews entrepreneurs and showcases their business.

The Founder Hour

A bi-weekly podcast interviewing "the untold stories of the humans behind LA's hottest startups, businesses, and movements" hosted by USC alumni.

You can search Harvard Business Review to learn more articles on this topic. You can also check if your university library has a subscription to the Business Source Complete database, which provides full-text access to Harvard Business Review articles, or use the library’s interlibrary loan service to access the article.

How to develop a solid business idea (Canadian Federation of Independent Business)
Ideas are everywhere! Some of the best and brightest business ideas have come from people just going about their daily lives and finding inspiration. People will say, “I wish this product or that company would do this,” and thus a new business is born...

Having Ideas Versus Having a Vision (Harvard Business Review)

In the past decade, firms have been praised for ideas. Experts have celebrated the power of brainstorming and idea-generation techniques. Eureka light bulbs have populated the covers of many books. Businessmen have been asked to improve their creative attitudes. And 2009 was named the Year of Creativity and Innovation by the European Union...

Breakthrough Thinking from Inside the Box (Harvard Business Review)

Reprint: R0712E Companies often begin their search for great ideas either by encouraging wild, outside-the-box thinking or by conducting quantitative analysis of existing market and financial data and customer opinions. Those approaches can produce...

To find more Harvard Business Review articles on the topics of creativity and innovation.

Business Idea Center (Entreprenuer.com)

Popular news and articles about business ideas.

SpringWise

Search for new innovative business ideas unearthed every day, across sectors and regions.

Small Business Idea List and Business Idea Generator

Click the link to find a Worldcat book record; enter a zipcode to check which library nearby has the book you can borrow. When the record is not available, a link to Amazon is provided.

• Bland, David J, Alexander Osterwalder, Alan Smith, and Trish Papadakos. Testing Business Ideas. 2020. Print.

• Dashinsky, Artiom. Generating Product Ideas: Actionable Techniques for Finding New Business Ideas. 2020. Print

• Dyer, Jeffrey H, Hal Gregersen, and Clayton M. Christensen. The Innovator's Dna: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators. 2019. Print.

• Knapp, Jake, John Zeratsky, and Braden Kowitz. Sprint: How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days. 2016. Print.

• Raz, Guy, and Nils Parker. How I Built This: The Unexpected Paths to Success from the World's Most Inspiring Entrepreneurs. 2020. Print.

Read More Books on This Topic.

• Ensure a Viable Business Model and Powerful Value Proposition

• Adopt Lean Startup Principles