If you have to ask “Do I have product market fit?”, then you don’t have product market fit. PMF smacks you in the face and the market pulls you along kicking and screaming.

You need both ingredients. The product/idea and the market. Many great ideas look meh when presented to the wrong market.

If you wait for others to validate your idea before starting, you'll never make a cent—it will be an uphill battle. True validation comes when people are willing to pay for your idea, service, or product. To reach that point, you need to take action and put something out there. If you believe in your idea, start by building a minimal version and see if people are willing to pay for it.

Moreover, being the first with an idea is incredibly rare and often not advantageous. Having competitors means that people are already willing to pay for this idea, which is a positive indicator.

I'm assuming this is a clear yes, but just to clarify : was it in groups that you think definitely should be the users of the tool you were thinking about?

And as a pivot, is there a clear need in another segment of people that wasn't your first idea/market?

(Just for some brain noodling if you need some : I worked with a client recently to angle to a different market that wasn't their intended one; the product does exactly the same thing just has a different tone and additional topics. Their original market absolutely needs it, but they don't recognize the need nor want to pay for it so would be extremely difficult to get to adopt, the new market does recognize the need for it and is absolutely willing to pay... once they realize it's an option for them - simpler problem to fix).

At $10K MRR+ and churn rate < 5%.