Get Insights: Get a clear direction for your idea
Before you build, before you invest, before you scale, discover what your customers actually need and validate whether your ideas have real growth potential.
Product-Market Fit workshops for sustainable startups
Dr Chloe Sharp authored on research for validating concepts and building products
Design Thinking Training on the UKRI-backed Engineering Biology Accelerator
Usability Testing trainer for upcoming product managers
The cost of building without validating first
Too many businesses rush from idea to execution, burning time and money on solutions nobody wants. This costly mistake shows up in predictable ways: teams build elaborate features that customers never touch, solve problems that don't exist, and target markets they've never truly understood. The result? Months of development wasted on the wrong solution.
Even worse, businesses that skip validation often discover fundamental flaws only after launch, forcing expensive pivots when resources are already stretched thin. They miss their market window while competitors who did their homework capture the opportunity. Without proper validation, even great ideas struggle to find their audience, leading to poor adoption rates and products that fail despite significant investment.
The pattern is always the same: assume instead of ask, build instead of test, launch instead of validate. Every day spent building the wrong thing is a day your competitors spend building the right one.
Our evidence-led, problem-first approach
We help you validate ideas through real customer insights, employee research, and market analysis, so you can invest in opportunities with actual growth potential.
Employee Research
Uncover internal process improvements and AI/automation opportunities by researching how your team actually works, not how you think they work.
Rapid Prototyping
Test concepts quickly and cheaply through prototypes, concept testing, and MVP validation before committing to full development.
Market Validation
Test demand before you build. From competition analysis to market sizing, we help you understand if there's a real opportunity worth pursuing.
Evidence-Based Ideation
Turn research insights into actionable opportunities through design sprints, ideation sessions, and data-driven prioritisation.
User Insights
Get inside your customers' heads through interviews, surveys, and observation to understand their real needs, not their stated preferences.
Strategic Focus
Cut through the noise and focus on what matters. We help you identify which opportunities deserve your attention and resources.
Our research, testing and experimentation toolkit
We use the right mix of research methods for your budget, timeline, and objectives, adapted to the stage your idea, product or service is in.
Discover Needs
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Deep, qualitative insights into customer problems, motivations, and workflows
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Understand internal processes and identify automation opportunities
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Competition research, market sizing, and opportunity assessment
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Watch how people actually behave, not just what they say they do
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Quantify demand and validate findings across larger customer segments
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Monitor online conversations to understand unmet needs and pain points
Test Ideas
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From paper sketches to interactive prototypes—test before you build
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Test your core assumptions and value propositions with real users
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Measure real demand through targeted ads and conversion tracking
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Gather feedback on ideas and concepts from your target audience
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Compare different approaches to see what resonates with users
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Ensure your solutions are actually usable and intuitive
Validate Concepts
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Build minimal versions to test core functionality with real users
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Get early adopters using and providing feedback on your solution
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Test internal processes and automation in controlled environments
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Watch how people actually behave, not just what they say they do
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Involve customers in designing solutions to their problems
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Measure real purchase intent through pre-orders and waiting lists
Our training and workshops
Alongside our expert consultancy services, we provide training and workshops
Novice: Haven’t done research before
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Learn first-hand how to identify market groups, and validate and test your ideas using Facebook ads. Together we’ll identify Facebook audiences and set-up multiple campaigns to give you the blueprint to set this up on your own.
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Starting with assumptions and hypotheses, we’ll identify your research objectives that will inform your interview guide for talking to anyone from employees to customers to experts about their problem and your idea. This will inform how you revise and review your solution.
Intermediate: Done some research before
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In this session we’ll explore innovation frameworks including Design Thinking and Lean Startup to show you how to apply them through research, testing and experimentation for continuous improvement and insights.
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Artificial Intelligence and automation are great starting points for evaluating where innovation can occur in your business, and to identify use cases from easy wins to complex products, we’ll learn how to explore this.
Expert: Elevate your research and testing skills
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We’ll explore, evaluate and apply a range of business and product frameworks to give you a foundation in how to apply a product mindset to developing and building your business to the next level.
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We’ll cover the leadership styles that are conducive to innovation, how to create an experimentation culture, develop your social capital internally and externally to competitively innovate and use storytelling to win stakeholders over.
Case studies
RegTech Startup: User Research and Beta Testing (Service Standard)
A RegTech startup had developed a platform for government policy makers, but wasn't sure if it addressed real user needs or would see adoption in complex government workflows.
The situation: The founders had invested months in technical development but lacked confidence that policymakers would integrate their solution into existing processes. They needed validation before committing further resources.
What we did: We conducted targeted research with UK government policy makers to understand their daily challenges and workflow requirements. We then facilitated beta testing sessions with early prototypes to validate core functionality and user experience.
The outcome: Rather than building features based on assumptions, the startup focused on solving genuine problems that policymakers faced regularly. This led to strong user adoption and clear product-market fit within the government sector.
Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure: User Testing
An EV charging startup wanted to understand how residents would use proposed EV charging points before a local authority invested in an expensive infrastructure rollout.
The situation: The council had allocated significant funding for EV charging infrastructure but needed to validate whether their proposed locations and charging types would meet real user needs and drive adoption in their community.
What we did: We conducted a comprehensive user behaviour evaluation, combining observational research of current parking patterns with in-depth interviews of EV owners and potential adopters. We tested early concepts through real-world pilot installations and gathered feedback on usage patterns, accessibility, and integration with daily routines.
The outcome: Our research revealed that residents prioritised convenience and reliability over speed of charging, leading to a complete redesign of the infrastructure strategy that better matched actual user behaviour and needs.