How to find a price and market share for much improved replacement for a disposable medical device?

First of all, starting a business on revenue generated from affiliate sales or incidental revenue is going to be minor and not enough to scale much less build a business. Unless you're a "solo-preneur" you'll need some additional form of revenue if you intend to add to the software-as-service website after it's launched. Also, you need to determine a) if you have a budget allocated for completion of this project, and you would be able to estimate this based on completing a business plan (if you have not already done so), and then calling several agencies for estimates. Expect to pay (at least five grand to get it off the ground). As a developer, I used eCommerce daily, and would be interested in a related service that could measure factors such as tracking visitor peregrinations through my site and what drove them to place one order over another, for example, Most other data I get through the eCommerce provider. So I would say that one of the reason's it's difficult to come up with some of these factors is not yet know enough about the business model itself. You can't determine size of a market without first identifying specifically what it is, and how that may change. You'd need to try a trial run, talk to some similar ventures, (especially similar ones that are local so you can meet them personally). I have no issue with all the jargon you're using, but I do not agree with the sentiment that traditional business references won't help. You need a business plan if you have not already completed one. The next step is narrowing in on target audience; you're coming up with numbers and estimations based on theory and not on actual product launch and tests - and this can be fatal for any kind of launch where presumptions dominate over exact data. I think once you narrow this in more, focus on niche market(s), find some ways to test your concept (so you can get what's called proof of concept), figure out how you are going to finance this while it's struggling for its first years, figure out how to scale and measure ROI, you might have something to work with. I would go to Score.org, and look up some different business plans, business model mock-ups, find references to software as service, then I'd look up similar businesses on Manta, Dunn & Bradstreet, or other corporate intelligence sites, look for similar entities (most of which flopped statistically) and look for local businesses that are similar in practice or intent and break bread with them. There's simply not enough meat on the bones for me to speculate on possible income streams; it's like going in front of investors and explaining to them how big a market share is and how much it generates annually and then that your business will exploit that market share. You need to explain how, why it's different and unique, how you'll compete, and what your revenue sources will be and show some kind of sustained profit through at least 1 to 2 years before they'll part with a nickel. So by the same token you have to assume the onus of conducting more due diligence.

Total Addressable (at least in the US) can be built based on market data sets, both free and for fee. For early child care centers, Market Data Retrieval and NCES (publicly available data set) are two recommended sources. For Serviceable, that depends on a) your own business / operating model and b) the current and projected penetration of comparable competitors in market. For the former, consider things like technology usage and implementation capabilities. For the latter, if you have identified clear competitors, it is unlikely that you will have access to accurate info. So, if you can estimate these numbers and reverse-engineer, that's a good starting point. This would also be a great time to consider how your SAAS product is differentiated and will give you a chance to think through different scenario models for customer "switching" (from an existing competitor product to your own).

As a tech marketer - I am always looking for the fastest, cheapest yet reliable research in order to create competitive intelligence internal documents, stats for blog posts, etc. Some people live by the "if it isn't on the first page, it doesn't matter" when it comes to leveraging search engines as a research tool. However, often when we are looking for value, we have to realize that anything REALLY worthwhile these days from a content perspective is typically gated behind a web form, or nestled inside a blog post. So, expect to spend a few hours in order to get through all the form gates, and also make sure you're using as specific and direct search terms as possible - then getting more generic if results are not ideal. Some other tips: -Have a few "burner" email addresses setup with gmail or hotmail, etc. - these allow you to get content when filling out forms to get White Papers, Reports, Case Studies, etc. without your primary inbox getting stuffed with marketing emails. -In the form fill process, if available put "student" or "researcher" as typically sales reps pass by these "leads" when the form gets dumped into the CRM queue. -Don't forget specialty search sites and tools like Wolfram Alpha for more "numbers" derived searches. -Also, like your question here - always seek the wisdom of crowds in addition to machine learning algorithms! Hope this is helpful! Search on!

Even if your competitor continuously capitalizes on your ideas, by imitating your product features, etc., and even if he grows exponentially faster than you, it shouldn't intimidate you. Similar product, less money, whatever else, doesn't matter. Get awesomely creative with your marketing. Focus on the user experience and forget the competition. That's one thing no competitor can ever take away from you. And, the only thing you've got to mediate risk. I'd love to share more with you over a 15 minute call. I can guide you through getting a better understanding of your customers, and developing an awesome user experience, by moving beyond conventional marketing. Looking forward to it. Adrian

Maybe hire a freelance market researcher to find out? ;) Generally, something like this is going to appeal to fortune 500 companies. Smaller companies and entrepreneurs are going to be doing market research themselves. From the question it is difficult to tell if you have come into possession of such a platform, or are thinking about building one. Regardless, to succeed it's crucial that you deeply understand who your target customer is and what pain you are solving for them. Most ideas for a business stem from the entrepreneur's discovery of a solution to a problem for a certain group of people. Since who has the greatest need is unclear to you at the moment, the best thing to do might be to contact people at companies who you think have the greatest need. Find a way to get in touch with someone at the company involved in hiring market researchers, and ask them what challenges they face. You can also talk with a few market researchers themselves to get an idea of where they see the greatest demand of companies looking to hire them. Hope this helps.