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| Criterion | ![]() Business Strategy 5-Minuten VC-Check | ![]() Growth Golden Circle | ![]() Product Discovery Smoke Test | ![]() Product Discovery Fake Door Test |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | The 5-Minute VC Check clarifies opportunities and strategic options at the earliest idea stage. It compares problem quality, customer willingness to pay, alternatives, differentiation, and market potential, and captures the result as a VC-check note, go/sharpen/park decision, and risk list. | In positioning and communication, what an offering actually stands for often becomes blurred. The Golden Circle sharpens a product's inner rationale and connects purpose, approach, and offering into a clear statement. | When demand only needs to be roughly verified, it tests interest with minimal effort. It measures whether people would take a next step at all. | When demand is still unclear, it measures interest in a feature before it is built. It separates real behavior from polite agreement and deliberately keeps build effort small. |
Complexitydifferent | Low | Low | Low | Medium |
Timedifferent | 5-15 min | 30-60 min | 1-5 Tage | 1-5 Tage |
Participantsdifferent | 1-5 | 1-8 | Nutzertraffic | Nutzertraffic |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Workshop + async | Async | Async |
Outputdifferent | VC-check note, Go/sharpen/park decision, Risk and assumption list, Next validation step | Why Statement, Messaging Notes, Positioning Draft | Interest Metrics, Conversion Signal, Learning Note | Click Data, Interest Signal, Learning Decision |
Tagsno overlap | StartupValidationCompetition | MarketingPositioningCommunication | ValidationExperimentsDemandGrowth | ValidationExperimentsDemandDiscovery |



