I am not a lawyer but it is my understanding of patent law in America that if you sell an item that you want to patent the patent office might be able to deny your claim because of prior art. Let me know if this is off base.
My understanding is that you have 1 year from the first time you publicize the invention to file your provisional. For international patents, though, this is not the case; you need to do it right away.
According to a couple of books I've read, the 1-year rule applies in the US, but if you're interested in foreign patents, you have to keep your design under wraps until after you have applied for the patents, at least in several important jurisdictions.
Perhaps voting down is one way of saying that the above information is incorrect. It would be more helpful, however, to provide the correct information.
1. Find a way to talk to your prospective customers according to their channels. Sometimes this is easier in B2B.
2. Talk to them about your ideas (ideally with some mockups) and see if it's something they are interested in.
3. If so, do whatever it takes to get money in exchange for something that you can build as quickly as possible.
4. Iterate based on their / market's feedback.
5. Worry about patents, etc. once you have an idea that you can actually make money with.
Edit: this is my approach, anyway. FWIW.