How to get the next web development project ideas

People often ask me do you have web development project ideas? Even one of my past clients, after I finished up his first project, ask me the same question. How to answer such a question? How to get such ideas? Where to get them?

How and where to get your next web development project ideas?

There are plenty of places to get them. Let’s take a look at each of these places one by one.

1. Freelance marketplace sites

Nowadays there are plenty of freelance marketplace sites like upWork, freelancer.com and the others. There are also some of them that focused on a local or regional area.

Just sign up an account on those sites so you can read the brief web development project descriptions there.

We are not suggesting you copy them. Instead, generate the idea from them.

For example, you saw a web project for developing a website for kids to learn the algorithm. From there, you can note the pros and cons of that project, the room for refinements, and others.

With such a process, usually, you will get a fresh list of ideas.

2. Online forums

There are still plenty of online forums these days. Just give more attention to details on the online forums you had attended to.

Notice what the problem with that forum and see if it’s possible to fix it by providing another website.

Again, from there, you can get more ideas for your next web development project.

As an example: I often notice that people are discussing “this website alternative” or “that website alternative”

Just notice and follow such a discussion. Then, check if the existing alternatives of the web can fulfill the demand.

Otherwise, it’s a room for you to add more ideas to your list.

3. Social media

I bet most of us are still active in social media. Even me, who has a low interest in such service, is still checking the Twitter feed, sometimes.

Follow the people in your targeted niche or your current niche. Observe what are their problems.

See if the solution of those problems can be a form in a web application.

4. Your own problems

All of us had our own problems. Let’s take a look on my own. Currently, I am looking for a Yoast readability meter tool. I expect the alternative tool to get integrated with WordPress as a plugin.

However, it is not possible to install only the Yoast readability meter tool without installing the whole Yoast plugin. Maybe someone out there will tackle this idea? I hope so.

5. WordPress

As the most popular CMS, WordPress offers many problems for us to generate the idea for the next web development project.

Notice the last drama about WordPress Gutenberg last year? Someone build an alternative of WordPress called ClassicPress. They say this ClassicPress is the WordPress enhanced version without Gutenberg .

I even consider switching to this ClassicPress when I still had a hostile opinion about Gutenberg. But, the challenge I thought at the time was about the availability of the plugins.

One of the WordPress power is its plugins availability. You can always find any plugins for any need.

Then, again, if you can’t find it, then it’s probably another chance to build such a plugin. That’s just another idea to add, right?

6. Github

If you are a tech-savvy person, it’s worth to check the Github “Explore” menu. There are myriad open source projects there.

Pick some that make you interested. Look at their “Issue” tab. See if you can fork the repo and send a PR to fix them.

Such a process usually triggers some new ideas for the next web development projects you’ll love.

Validate them

Once you get some ideas, it’s necessary to validate them. There are several ways to do such validation.

• Open a new thread on the related forums and ask.

• If there are no related forums, look for related subReddit and ask there. Just make sure you follow the rule.

• Or look for some related group, either on WhatsApp or Slack and ask your question there.

• Set up an online survey and invite your relatives to fill them.

The more of answer data you can get, usually the better of validation you had run on the idea.

Just take it easy if some folks turned down the idea or give a hostile opinion about it.

It’s fine. Just accept them as another answer to add to your database.

Validate more

Build an early e-mail list. Set up a landing page somewhere, and start collecting the people’s e-mail who are interested in your idea.

You can even update them more in case you need to pivot your idea along the way.

If someone copies it?

No worry. If someone copies your idea, it just another factor that your next idea for the next web development project had a good potential to take off.

It’s just another proof that somebody thinks the same as you. You can monitor them and regard them as one of your competitors.

Or else, you may approach them and propose the offer to work together instead of competing with each other.

Refine the idea and its requirement

You also need to refine the potential idea you had in mind. Then, go down to write the technical requirement including the tech stacks you’re going to use on implementation.

The easiest option to start is WordPress since it’s free, open source, and has a strong community to support.

However, this will really depend on your technical requirements. For such a complicated web application, it may be better to go with a framework like CakePHP, Zend, or Ruby on Rails instead of using CMS like WordPress.

It will be easy if you are a web developer yourself. But if you are not, you need to spend some budgets to consult with a web developer about your technical requirement and the strongest candidate for the tech stacks.

Don’t rush into the implementation as it will just be a disaster for all parties when it goes wrong.

Conclusion

To get a fresh and potential idea for the next web development project isn’t an easy process. 

For some folks, it even takes weeks or months. Personally, I think it’s better to spend some time to generate, refine, pivot the idea rather than go with implementation blindly.