How to validate a startup idea in Nigeria in 7 days

You have an idea. You've thought about it for weeks, maybe months. You've told your friends, your family, possibly the entire Slack group at your last networking event in Yaba. But you don't actually know if anyone will pay for it.

This is where most Nigerian founders get stuck. They spend six months building, launch to crickets, and blame the market. The real problem: they never validated the core assumption. They built what they thought people wanted, not what people actually need.

This playbook walks you through validating a startup idea in seven days using real customer data, not hunches. You'll talk to actual potential customers, test your core assumptions, and decide whether to proceed or pivot—all before you write a single line of code or spend serious money. What you'll walk away with: clarity on whether your idea has legs, who your real customer is, and what problem you're actually solving.

Day 1: Define your riskiest assumption

Every startup idea rests on assumptions. Some are riskier than others. Your job on Day 1 is to name the one assumption that, if wrong, kills the whole idea.

Let's say you're building a logistics app for small traders in Kano. Your assumptions might include:

• Small traders need faster delivery than current options
• They're willing to pay a commission per order
• They have smartphones and use WhatsApp regularly
• They trust apps from Nigerian companies
• They'll switch from their current supplier if the price is right

Which one, if false, ends the business? Probably not the last one—switching is common if the value is clear. But if small traders in Kano don't have reliable smartphones or data? That's a foundation-level problem.

Write down your three riskiest assumptions. Be honest. The ones that make you slightly uncomfortable are usually the right ones.

For most Nigerian B2C or B2B startups, the riskiest assumptions tend to be:

1. Customer willingness to pay — Will they actually spend money, or just use it for free?
2. Problem severity — Is this a nice-to-have or a genuine pain point they lose sleep over?
3. Market access — Can you actually reach these customers cheaply and at scale?

Pick one. You'll test it over the next six days.

Day 2: Find 10 potential customers

You need to talk to people who match your target customer profile. Not your friends who will be nice to you. Actual strangers who fit the description.

If your idea targets small-scale traders, you need to find small-scale traders. If it's for freelance designers in Lagos, find freelance designers. This sounds obvious, but most founders skip this step and talk to their existing network instead.

Here's where to find them:

Physical locations: Visit markets, co-working spaces, business hubs. Yaba has dozens of tech co-working spaces. Lekki has freelancer communities. Kano's Sabon Gari market has thousands of small traders. Spend two hours there. Talk to ten people. Buy something to justify your presence.

Online communities: Facebook groups for entrepreneurs, Twitter/X threads about your industry, WhatsApp groups for your target demographic. LinkedIn works if your audience is corporate.

Referrals: Ask one person you know to introduce you to three people in your target market. Those three introduce you to three more. This is slower but higher quality.

Paid recruitment: If you're serious, use Respondent or similar platforms. Post on local job boards. Offer a small incentive—₦2,000–₦5,000 for a 20-minute call.

Your goal: 10 conversations by end of Day 2. Not emails. Not surveys. Conversations. Phone calls, video calls, or in-person. Real dialogue.

Day 3: Run customer interviews

Don't pitch your idea. Don't sell. Interview.

Your goal is to understand the customer's current reality, not to validate your solution. Most founders mess this up by leading the witness. "Don't you think an app for X would be great?" is a leading question. "How do you currently solve for X?" is an open question.

Here's a simple interview structure:

Opening (2 minutes): Thank them. Explain you're researching a problem in their space and want to understand how they currently work. No pitch.

Current state (8 minutes): Ask:

• How do you currently handle [the problem]?
• What tools or people do you use?
• How much time does this take each week?
• What frustrates you most about the current process?
• How much are you paying for this now?

Problem depth (5 minutes): Ask:

• When was the last time this problem cost you money or time?
• Have you tried to solve this before? What happened?
• If you could change one thing about how you handle this, what would it be?

Closing (5 minutes): Ask:

• Who else should I talk to about this?
• Can I follow up if I have more questions?

Do not mention your idea. Not once. Your job is to listen and take notes.

Record the interviews if they consent. You'll want to review them later. Patterns emerge on the second listen.

Day 4: Analyse what you heard

Review your ten interviews. Look for patterns.

What problem came up unprompted? If seven out of ten people mentioned the same frustration without you asking, that's a real problem.

What's the current workaround? If customers are already solving this (even badly), they care about it. If no one has tried to solve it, ask yourself why.

What's the switching cost? How hard would it be for them to change their current solution? If they're deeply embedded with a competitor, your idea needs to be dramatically better.

What would they pay? Don't ask directly. Listen for clues. "We'd pay whatever it costs to avoid doing this manually" is different from "We barely have budget for this."

Create a simple table:

If most scores are below 6, your riskiest assumption is wrong. The problem isn't severe enough. Pivot or kill it.

If scores are 7+, you have something. Move to Day 5.

Day 5: Test willingness to pay

Now you need to know if they'll actually spend money.

Don't ask "Would you pay for this?" Everyone says yes. Instead, create friction.

Option 1: Pre-order or commitment Tell three to five of your strongest interview candidates: "I'm building a solution for this. If I launch it in four weeks at ₦X per month, would you commit to a three-month trial? I need 20 paying customers to launch."

Get them to put skin in the game. A deposit, a signed agreement, a public commitment. Anything that costs them something—money, reputation, or time.

Option 2: Landing page with email capture Build a simple landing page (Carrd, Webflow, even Google Sites works). Describe the problem and your solution in plain language. Add a "Notify me when we launch" button. Share it with your network and in relevant communities.

If 15% of people who see it sign up, you have traction. If it's below 5%, the messaging isn't resonating.

Option 3: Sell a waitlist spot Charge ₦1,000–₦5,000 for early access. Not a huge amount—just enough to test commitment. If ten people pay, you've validated willingness to pay and raised ₦10,000–₦50,000 toward your MVP.

This approach works well in Nigeria because payment friction is real. If someone pays, they're serious.

Day 6: Test your core value proposition

Now you know the problem is real and people might pay. But will they choose your solution over alternatives?

Create a simple prototype or mockup. This doesn't need to be polished. It needs to show your core value.

If you're building a logistics app, show a wireframe of how a trader books a pickup. If it's a payment tool, show how a transaction flows. If it's a community platform, show what the feed looks like.

Use Figma, even pen and paper. Screenshot it. Share it with your interview candidates and ask:

• Does this solve the problem we discussed?
• What's confusing?
• What would you change?
• Would you use this?

Listen for hesitation. If they say "I'd use it if..." that's valuable feedback. If they say "I don't understand what this does," your value prop isn't clear.

You're not looking for love here. You're looking for "Yeah, I'd use this" without major caveats.

If most responses are lukewarm, your solution doesn't match the problem. Iterate or kill it.

Day 7: Decide

You've now spent seven days gathering real data. It's time to decide: proceed, pivot, or kill.

Green light: Proceed if:

• At least 7 out of 10 customers rated the problem 7+/10
• At least 3 people committed to paying or signed up
• Your prototype got positive feedback without major confusion
• You can articulate exactly who your customer is and what problem you're solving

Yellow light: Pivot if:

• The problem is real but your solution is wrong
• Customers want something slightly different
• A different customer segment has a more severe version of the problem

Red light: Kill if:

• Problem severity is below 6/10 across the board
• No one will commit to paying
• You discovered an existing solution that's already winning
• You realised you're not the right person to build this

Killing an idea after seven days is a win. You've saved yourself six months and real money.

If you get a green light, move immediately to Ship your MVP in 2 weeks: a Nigerian founder's playbook. You've validated the problem. Now build the solution.

Real example: Validating a B2B SaaS idea

One of the founders we work with at LaunchPad, Yemi, validated a payroll software for SMEs in Lagos using this exact process. Day 1, he identified the riskiest assumption: that SME owners would pay a monthly subscription when they currently use free spreadsheets. Days 2–3, he interviewed ten business owners. Days 4–5, he found that seven out of ten rated payroll complexity as 8+/10 and five committed to a ₦15,000/month trial. Day 6, he showed a prototype. Day 7, he decided to proceed. He launched an MVP six weeks later and now has 50+ paying customers. The validation saved him from building features no one wanted.

Common mistakes to avoid

Talking only to your network: Your friends will be nice. Strangers will be honest.

Leading questions: "Wouldn't an app for this be amazing?" doesn't tell you anything. "How do you currently handle this?" does.

Skipping the willingness-to-pay test: People say they'd buy things they never actually buy. Real money is the only proof.

Pitching instead of listening: Your job in these seven days is to learn, not to sell. Selling comes after validation.

Ignoring negative feedback: If eight people say your idea won't work, that's data. Don't dismiss it because you believe in your vision.

Waiting for perfect: You don't need perfect interviews or perfect data. You need good enough data to make a decision.

What changes when you validate in Nigeria

Validation in Nigeria has specific constraints and advantages.

Constraints:

• Internet penetration varies by region. Your Lagos idea might not work in Kano without adjustment.
• Payment infrastructure matters. If your idea depends on credit cards, you've already lost 70% of the market. If it works with USSD or Flutterwave, you're golden.
• Trust in apps is lower than in developed markets. You'll need social proof or word-of-mouth faster.

Advantages:

• Direct access to customers. You can walk into a market and find your target user. Try that in London.
• Rapid feedback loops. Nigerians will tell you exactly what they think. No corporate politeness.
• Lower cost of validation. Paying ten people ₦2,000 each for interviews is ₦20,000. In the US, that's ₦500,000+.

Use these advantages. Lean into the directness. Skip the polished pitch and talk to real people.

Pricing and go-to-market during validation

During these seven days, you're testing the idea, not the pricing. But pricing questions will come up. When they do, understand the Nigerian market context.

For B2C products, most Nigerian consumers expect freemium or low-cost options. For B2B, businesses are willing to pay if ROI is clear. Check out Pricing models that actually work for Nigerian startups for deeper guidance once you move past validation.

Building a team to accelerate validation

If you're solo, validation takes longer. If you have a co-founder, especially a technical one, you can run interviews in parallel and build mockups faster. If finding a co-founder is blocking you, read How to find a technical co-founder in Lagos.

Tracking your validation progress

Use a simple spreadsheet to track:

1. Assumption being tested
2. Interview date and customer name
3. Problem severity rating (1-10)
4. Willingness to pay (yes/no/maybe)
5. Key quote or insight
6. Next step

This keeps you honest. At the end of Day 7, you'll have clear data to make a decision.

When to extend beyond seven days

Seven days is a minimum viable validation cycle. If you're testing a complex B2B idea or a new market, you might need 10–14 days. But don't extend just because you're uncertain. Uncertainty is the point. You're testing to reduce it.

If after seven days you're still unclear, that itself is data. It usually means your idea isn't resonating strongly enough. Either iterate fast or move on.

FAQ

Q: What if I can't find 10 customers to interview in my city? A: Use online channels—Facebook groups, Twitter communities, LinkedIn. Offer a small incentive. If you genuinely can't find 10 people interested in your problem space, that's a red flag. The market might be too small or you're targeting the wrong segment.

Q: Should I tell people about my idea during interviews? A: Not until the end, if at all. Your job is to understand their current reality first. If you pitch early, they'll respond to your pitch, not their actual needs. After you understand the problem deeply, you can share your solution and get feedback.

Q: What if everyone I interview says yes to everything? A: They're being polite or you're leading them. Reframe your questions to be more open-ended. Ask harder questions. "How much would you pay?" instead of "Would you pay ₦10,000?" Push back on vague answers. Real validation feels like friction, not agreement.

Q: Can I validate entirely online without meeting people in person? A: Yes, but it's weaker. Phone or video calls work. In-person is better because you see how they actually work. If your idea is for remote workers or online communities, online validation is fine. If it's for physical retail or markets, you need to visit.

Q: What if my validation shows the idea won't work? A: That's success. You've learned something that would have cost you months and money to discover by building. Pivot to a related problem, a different customer segment, or a new idea entirely. The validation framework works for all three.

What to do next

If you've completed this seven-day validation and got a green light, your next move is building. Start with Ship your MVP in 2 weeks: a Nigerian founder's playbook to move from validation to a testable product.

If you're building a B2B product and need to think through pricing strategy before you launch, read Pricing models that actually work for Nigerian startups.

If you're solo and realised you need a technical co-founder to move fast, check How to find a technical co-founder in Lagos.