By Sarah Hernholm

MBO Partners’ State of Independence 2025 research estimates that more than 72.9 million Americans are freelancing in some capacity, accounting for roughly 36 percent of the workforce. That shift has people of all ages looking for faster, more innovative ways to test ideas without wasting time or resources. ChatGPT has quickly become one of the most effective tools for doing exactly that. It speeds up the early thinking, reveals blind spots, and helps refine ideas long before money goes out the door.

The four prompts below can help anyone, whether a teen launching a first project or an adult building a side hustle, pressure test and position an idea for success in 2026.

1. Use ChatGPT To Pressure Test Your Idea Before You Spend A Dollar

Ideas tend to feel brilliant in your head. They tend to feel less brilliant when they meet customer expectations, pricing realities, or existing competitors. Most early-stage entrepreneurs do not run enough pre-launch analysis. Teen entrepreneurs often skip it because they are unsure what to look for. Adults might ignore it because time is limited.

ChatGPT can step in and ask the hard questions you may not think to ask yourself.

Prompt: Act as a sceptical investor. Challenge my business idea from every angle. Identify the five most significant risks, the costliest assumptions, potential red flags, and anything that would make you pass on this idea. Then give me strategies to mitigate each one. Here is my idea: [insert idea].

_{Action steps after running this prompt:}

1. Take the risks ChatGPT flags and sort them into broad groups like customer, financial, operational, and competitive. It makes everything easier to see at a glance.
2. Choose the one or two risks that feel most important and come up with small, simple tests that can show whether they are real concerns.
3. Use what you learn to tweak your idea, then rerun the prompt to get a fresh read on where things stand.

This process forces clarity early on, when adjustments are still cheap, and momentum is easier to build.

2. Use ChatGPT To Unearth A Positioning Angle No Competitor Is Using

A business with unclear positioning is one that customers overlook. That is even more true now, when AI-powered solutions crowd nearly every category. People want to know why your product deserves their attention, their money, and their trust.

ChatGPT can help you identify the whitespace most new founders miss.

Prompt: Act as a brand strategist. Analyse competitors in my industry and identify gaps in messaging, pricing, target audience, and value proposition. Then create three differentiated positioning angles I could own in 2026, angles competitors are not currently using. My idea: [insert idea]. My competitors: [list competitors].

^{Action steps after running this prompt:}

1. Look at the three positioning angles ChatGPT gives you and see how they stack up against what you are already thinking.
2. Pick the angle that feels the most realistic for your skills, your time, and the resources you actually have.
3. Try folding that angle into your website headline, your pitch language, or even your social media bio so it becomes part of how you talk about the idea.
4. Share the updated message with a handful of potential customers or peers and pay attention to what they react to or remember.

Clear positioning is not only about standing out. It is about helping customers instantly understand why you are the right fit for them.

3. Use ChatGPT To Build A 90 Day Launch Plan You Can Actually Execute

A lot of ideas never come to fruition because they stay abstract. A concrete plan changes that. It turns a vague desire to launch into something you can move on week by week.

ChatGPT is surprisingly effective at mapping out a realistic 90-day plan, especially for people who feel overwhelmed or unsure where to begin.

Prompt: Act as my operations and accountability coach. Turn my business idea into a realistic 90-day launch plan divided into weekly goals. Include market research tasks, product development milestones, an MVP plan, pricing tests, audience building actions, two marketing experiments, and metrics to track. End with a non-negotiable list for me as the founder. Here is the idea: [insert idea].

^{Action steps after running this prompt:}

1. Input the weekly plan into your calendar so each task has an actual place to live. Real dates make it harder to ignore.
2. Look for the first few actions that will give you momentum, whether that is talking to potential customers or putting up a simple landing page.
3. Check in with the plan each week and make small adjustments based on what is moving you forward and what is not.

Momentum builds when you know exactly what to do next, not when you are still thinking about where to start.

4. Use ChatGPT To Craft The Pitch That Gets People On Board

Whether you are pitching investors, potential collaborators, early customers, or your own family, the success of your idea often comes down to how well you communicate it. Many pitches fail because they bury the most compelling part of the story.

ChatGPT can help refine your narrative into something punchy, simple, and memorable.

Prompt: Be my business pitch coach. Turn my idea into a 90-second pitch that is clear, compelling, and memorable. Include the problem I’m solving, why existing solutions fall short, my unique approach, early evidence or insights that validate the opportunity, and the call to action. Then write versions for investors, customers, and social media. My idea: [insert idea].

^{Action steps after running this prompt:}

1. Read each version of your pitch out loud. You will quickly hear which one feels the most natural to say.
2. Share that version with a few people you trust and ask them what they remembered or what caught their attention. Their reactions will tell you what to adjust.
3. Spend a little time with your opening line. Once that first sentence feels solid, the rest of the pitch usually comes together more easily.

Clarity builds confidence, and the higher your confidence, the better your chances of follow-through.

Why These ChatGPT Prompts Work For All Ages, All Stages, And All Ambitions

Shifting work patterns and the rise of side hustles have created a moment where people are more open than ever to building something of their own. These ChatGPT prompts do more than spark ideas. The prompts can help you identify gaps you might have missed and sort out what you need to do right now. Once you have that, taking the next step feels a lot less overwhelming.

Feature image credit: Getty

By Sarah Hernholm

Find Sarah Hernholm on LinkedIn.

Sourced from Forbes