Most people think investors possess magical instincts that they can smell profit the way a chef smells burnt food. But after decades across entrepreneurship, property development and deal-making, you’ll end up finding out that investment intuition isn’t mystical but rather, trained. It’s pattern recognition sharpened by the simple habit of paying attention to the right signals and ignoring the noise that distracts everyone else.
This guide is the blueprint.
If you want to know where the next opportunity is, don’t look for excitement, look for complaints. It’s nothing new that every profitable business or investment category today was once a frustration:
The mistake everyday people make is assuming complaints show danger. But to an entrepreneur, complaints are the clearest sign of unmet demand.
Spend one week listing the top 10 things customers, tenants, employees, neighbours, or suppliers constantly complain about. Then ask: What would people gladly pay to avoid here?
That question alone can reveal an opportunity worth six to seven figures.
This is one of the most powerful investment indicators and hardly anyone notices it. When people adopt a new behaviour faster than systems, regulations, or physical structures can support, growth opportunities explode.
Examples:
When behaviour outruns infrastructure, the gap creates opportunity.
This is where margins are biggest. In highly competitive, well-understood markets (e.g., retail fuel, telecom data, groceries), customers know prices and compare aggressively. Profit is thin.
But in markets where customers feel confused, overwhelmed, unsure how to evaluate options, or scared of making the wrong decision, they will pay a premium for clarity and trust.
This is why property agents, health services, legal advice, insurtech, B2B software, and specialised skills can charge significantly more. Not because they’re expensive but because the customer’s fear of a bad choice is high.
If you find a market where people say:
“I don’t even know where to start,”
you’ve found a high-margin opportunity.
Investments are easier when you don’t have to convince money and it naturally moves along predictable paths.
In almost every sector, there is an upgrade ladder.
An entry-level purchase → a mid-tier upgrade → a premium upgrade → a maintenance upgrade.
Example in property:
Renting → apartment → townhouse → land → commercial → development.
Every rung offers its own opportunities if you know where the customer is about to climb.
Example in tech for SMEs:
Manual records → Excel → POS → accounting software → inventory suite → automation.
The best B2B companies build products that sit one step above what customers currently use never ten steps ahead.
Question to ask:
What are people already spending on?
What’s the next logical upgrade they will spend on soon?
Predict where money is headed, not where it currently sits.
Weak markets rely on opaque middlemen. Strong opportunities exist where middlemen:
Examples:
Freight forwarding, land documentation, artisan services, auto parts, property transactions, cross-border payments.
If you can remove friction, improve transparency, or speed up delivery, you instantly stand out in sectors where customers feel helpless.
The rule: If someone says “I don’t understand why this costs this much, there’s room for a better business model.
Customers lie unintentionally. Not maliciously but just humanly. They may say:
“I won’t pay for that,”
but they will pay if the pain is strong enough.
They may say:
“I’m only browsing,”
But they’re researching because something in their life is about to change.
The smartest investors will watch out or such behaviour.
Small signals that reveal big truths:
Behaviour predicts markets more reliably than surveys.
One of the easiest opportunities for SMEs is identifying things people spend on by default simply because they’ve always done it that way.
If a customer has been paying the same vendor, fee, or provider for years without reconsidering alternatives, that’s a market with defenseless incumbents.
These are markets ripe for entry because the existing players have grown complacent.
Every market has a hidden decision-maker. Sometimes it’s not the buyer but rather the influencer.
Examples:
High-potential opportunities exist when you build relationships with the real source of truth, a perfect example of this would be information platforms like the chuan grove residence price list or similar sources.
The reason such avenues are priceless is that it lets you win on a platform that shapes the market.
When a market is highly measurable and publicly understood, competition kills profit.
Markets with low transparency likeland in emerging neighbourhoods, wholesale supply chains, B2B operations tend to reward those who put in real work.
If you can:
…you gain a durable, unfair advantage.
Opportunity hides where information is messy.
The difference between the everyday person and the seasoned entrepreneur is simple as the fact that most people only look for opportunities when they need money. As an entrepreneur, you need to break the pattern and you train your eyes to notice these opportunities so you won’t just spot high-potential investments, but you’ll spot them before the rest of the market wakes up.
Read more:
The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Spotting High-Potential Investment Opportunities
