What Working Niche Scoring Looks Like (Technical Founders)

A worked example. Backend engineer thinking about leaving their job to start a company. Five candidates.

The Five Candidates

Distributed tracing for microservices. Database migration tooling. Internal API documentation generators. SaaS billing reconciliation. Open source dependency security scanning.

The Scores

Tracing: R5 F7 S6 D4 B7 = 29. Migration: R6 F4 S5 D6 B6 = 27. API docs: R7 F5 S4 D4 B5 = 25. Billing recon: R8 F8 S9 D6 B4 = 35. Dependency security: R7 F6 S8 D5 B5 = 31.

The Surprise

Billing reconciliation scored highest. The technical founder had no domain expertise (B=4) but the audience reachability and existing spend were strong. The technical excitement (tracing) scored fourth.

What the Founder Did

Picked billing reconciliation despite low builder-fit. Spent the next three weeks running problem interviews to learn the domain. Those interviews surfaced sharper differentiation that lifted the eventual product positioning.

What This Process Caught

The technically exciting niche (tracing) had weaker reachability and unclear differentiation. Without scoring, the founder would have built tracing for a year. The boring billing niche had a better launch shape.

What Working Scoring Produces

Not certainty. Just a better-aimed bet. The chosen niche still needs interviews and a build. Scoring is the filter.