Other first-time entrepreneurs often come to me and tell me they have this great idea that “nobody has ever done before,” a great new approach, a new way of thinking about something.

Great.  That is awesome, it really is.  But it’s not enough, and even people who should know better often forget.

Determining whether a company is investment-worthy (for you and your time, or for someone else and their money) is certainly a complex process, a balanced combination of team, idea, market, and technology.  But you can make it easier–for both you and your investors–even in this time of economic uncertainty.

Before you go out to raise money, find concrete, indisputable evidence that your company will succeed, and succeed ahead of the curve.

Bad ideas with evidence of success will probably be able to raise a round or two, but the “next big thing” without evidence of success will look just like everybody else’s “next big thing.”  With some concrete evidence, your concept stands out from the crowd as an opportunity rather than an annoyance.

It’s against our nature as entrepreneurs.  Our job is to be stubbornly optimistic about our concepts and ideas and to push toward their adoption with everything we have.  Gathering evidence of something we know will succeed seems like an inefficient use of time, or it seems impossible until we have everything built.

What is evidence?  I think of evidence as real users, real customers, or signed deals.  With a solid (and growing) pool of users, your consumer startup looks like a compelling investment opportunity over someone else’s idea.  A couple of deals are the best proof of concept that an enterprise play will work.

Of course, this isn’t always possible.  In a pinch, evidence can be anything that can reasonably stand in for users, customers or deals.  Beta customers are a good example, as are customers on something similar you built (maybe attract people to a very small part of your product that you can launch early).  Live software helps, and so does a proven advisor or team member.  The further away you are from real customers, the harder the sell, but reasonable evidence helps you stand out from the noise.

Combine this evidence with a technology, a market, and an idea that hasn’t been over-pitched (ask a lot of people) and is consistent with someone’s view of the future (again, ask a lot of people), and you’ll position yourself most optimally.