Many you meet on your journey will be NPCs

An Entrepreneur is an Eternal Optimist. 

They know they can always muster creativity, street smarts, and a desire to be the one driving the bus to find and develop new opportunities. They know the world is full of people, problems, technologies and others ways to get things done, and plenty of resources. They are confident they will find a way to combine these four raw materials together in a new and valuable way: so valuable that some people, maybe many, will pay for it.

Even with the confidence, the smart entrepreneur knows the challenge is not easy. While the world has all of the necessary ingredients for many opportunities, it is also very full of NPCs. In fact, out of all of the people an entrepreneur meets, 85% of them are likely to be NPCs! The important people for their quest are hidden in the bunch. If they talk with eight people, seven of those are likely to be uninterested in the entrepreneur or the journey that the entrepreneur is on.

Even more challenging: there are no apparent characteristics--no outwards signs--at least initially, that help the entrepreneur find these elusive but important people. They don't wear a sign saying, "Hey, I'm ready to play!", or, "Hey, I have an important problem to solve." They, too, know they are surrounded by NPCs and often feel they need to go it alone when they are trying to figure out their problems. They might manage to cobble together a group of like-minded people with similar troubles, to share tricks and workarounds. But they don't advertise. They usually just get on with what they need to do.

If we are trying to find these people, the usual demographics don't work. Rarely is age a strong indicator, and the omnipresent "25 to 40 year-olds" market segment probably only works for shampoo. Even if we are trying to take care of expanding group of "aging society", age is the barest of identifiers: within that group, we will find people stuck in wheelchairs and people driving to the golf course to play. The goals and barriers these people face vary too greatly for a single opportunity.

It would seem like there would be some self-selection working to help those of us who are looking to find active innovators, but startup events are rife with NPCs, in roles as investors, advisors and mentors, speakers and influencers. 

"They are rich and looking to invest." One of the most common NPCs you'll meet. 

"They have lots of business connections--they know everybody." Same. 

"Their family runs a business empire. They will vast expertise." That doesn't mean they understand the challenges you are going through as an entrepreneur.

What makes an NPC? They follow the algorithm. Oh, it may not be the actual algorithm of the MMO. But the outcome is the same: 

"I'm investing in {crypto, blockchain, AI} (Isn't everybody?) 

"I'm speaking at the _ED Conference. No, it's not the same as my YouTube video. Not exactly." 

"We don't really invest in your kind of business. We only invest in agentic AI companies." 

"I'm launching an incubator to support the fishing industry. I'm calling it 'Salt Water Valley.'"

[In defense of NPCs: we are all NPCs a lot of the time. It is not humanly possible to be "always on." Sometimes, after battling with the world, it is nice just to sit back and let someone else tell you what to do. 

Also, many of the NPCs we meet on our journey are active players in their own game of life. They don't need to be interested in what we are doing. 

Just remember, the vast majority of people you will meet as an entrepreneur are NPCs in your quest. You will need to learn some Tools for Explorers to figure out where the real players are--the ones who are taking action to fix problems in their life, which you might be able to fix. 

And by the way: if you are beginning to feel that you are always an NPC in your own life, it might be time to step out and do something. Learn to paint, instead of taking selfies, for example.]

Finding NPCs: It's All About the Normal Curve.

Around 300 years ago, some people began to notice that certain traits or outcomes seemed “normal” while others did not. They began to define what “normal” means in an empirical way. For many independent events—like repeated coin flips, multiple dice rolls, or the small errors made when grinding telescope mirrors—a large share of the results cluster around a middle, average point. Less common outcomes stretch away on either side, creating a “bell-shaped” curve (a European-style bell, at least). Human characteristics show the same pattern: the height, weight, and blood pressure of a random sample of people; the errors involved in measuring biological traits; test scores and IQ results; and even the willingness to try something new and unfamiliar.  Under the Bell Curve, or Normal Curve, 65% of the outcomes--the Normal outcomes--lie on either side of the average.  Further out, the two tails combined contain the remaining 35%

When you scan the entrepreneurial opportunity landscape, 65% of people are not going to rush out and try your new product.  They are not going to seek your product.  They are not going to click on an ad for your product.  They are not even going to look at your product.  On the street, they are going to just walk on by.  For your quest, they are NPCs, fiercely driven by FOMO, and following what the algorithm tells them to do, or, a famous Brand, a famous Influencer, or their friends. 

Finding Active Players (those who will want to know what you are building and maybe buy from you) is hard.  Somewhere hidden in all of those NPCs, a little more than 15% (half of the remaining 35% in the tails) are people trying to fix things in their lives. Find them.  They are the ones actively seeking a solution for an important problem, and they might pay you to help.

Fortunately, the NPCs in your quest, like NPCs in all games, begin to show up when Active Players are around. You will get the NPCs interested once a growing number of Active Players (also often called Early Adopters, or, better, Lead Users) start using your solution. 

Customers are not the only NPCs

We talk a lot about NPCs as customers (in their more common description, Early and Late Majority). But the successful entrepreneur needs far more than customers to survive: customers are important, to be sure, but rarely sufficient. In your quest, you will seek partners, investors, and mentors. In each group, you will find lots of NPCs (approximately 85%).  You will need to work hard to test whether the people who you want to work with are really committed to step out into the messy world and actively play.