The problem with this approach is that it doesn't necessarily tell you anything about the market for your product. It only tells you whether or not you underst

The problem with this approach is that it doesn't necessarily tell you anything about the market for your product. It only tells you whether or not you understand how to market or sell the product effectively over the web. Your first attempt at putting out a sales page is likely to be abysmal, and through continuous refinement you will get to a point where you can effectively convert people. I think the approach presented in the four steps to the epiphany is superior. Get out of the office and go talk to people who your solution will help. Find out what they need. Find out what things would make them buy and what things they don't care about. Talk to about 20 of them, and you'll get a pretty good idea what they are looking for. Seriously, instead of wasting your money on a poorly optimized ad campaign (that may even get you banned for life from adwords - see comment by fluxcapacitor) take that money and go buy "the four steps to the epiphany" on amazon, and then read it! If you want an even quicker and simpler intro, get the ebook "Entrepreneurs Guide to Customer Development", it is based on Steve Blank's work and it is well worth it: http://www.custdev.com/ http://www.custdev.com/. Overall those books will pay you back much more thoroughly than a hacked out adwords campaign ever will. Starting a business is about understanding a real business need, finding out who has that need, figuring out how you get in front of them, what will they pay for your solution, and then how to repeat that process on a regular basis. Oh, and it is almost certainly going to take more than four hours a week to do that.