Architecture Notes
3.1.1 · Marketing

Market Research for Solo Developers — Study the Market Called You

2026.07.11~4 min

00Overview

01Story

Situation

3.1 The strategy process starts with Research: understanding the market. Companies do this with surveys, interviews, panel studies, competitor analysis.

Complication

For one person, that cost is out of reach. Not enough time, not enough money, not enough hands.

Question

How does a solo developer come to understand a market?

02Solution

Criteria

  • No interview or survey costs
  • Runnable by one person
  • Still counts as genuine market understanding

Answer

Define the market as "me." This is not abandoning marketing: it is swapping the object of Research for the market called me. Then interrogate that market, over and over: why am I stuck? Why do I want that feature? Why don't the existing services satisfy me? Why do I behave the way I do?

Reason

Because you understand yourself less than you think. You can name your favorite food instantly — but asked why you love it, the words don't come. You, too, are a subject for analysis. That's why Research is still needed.

Research is a dialogue with yourself,
before it is an interview with anyone else.

Options

  • Corporate-grade market research — surveys, interviews, tabulation, statistics. Better precision, but the cost doesn't fit solo development. Not enough time, money, or hands; not taken.

03Result

Good

Interview, survey, tabulation costs: zero. The whole analysis runs inside one head. Marketing wasn't skipped — its cost was compressed to the limit.

Bad

One uncertainty survives: how many people in the world share your problem? Research alone can't answer that.

Follow-up

Facing that uncertainty and taking aim is the job of the analysis step: 3.1.2 STP.