Mastering Customer Discovery: Avoiding Pitfalls and Perfecting the Process
Today I will expose you common pitfalls of customer discovery & explore effective research strategies, emphasising problem definition, unbiased interviews, and network expansion through referrals.
Discovery pitfalls
This week I found two interesting patterns that might fail your customer discovery, even if you do everything right process-wise. The short version of how to nail the customer discovery: be obsessed with the problem & the user. The best way to learn is by talking to people who have been there & something didn’t work out. So let’s cover those 2 very common pitfalls:
Pitfall #1: Customer discovery without a clear problem & persona - it is great to explore the market & industries, but doing this without a clear goal will result in various challenges. This exploration will lead you to an overview of tons of problems and you will be frustrated in understanding which problem to solve. There are 2 possible solutions for this pitfall:
Solution #1: start trying to focus on solving problems you experience yourself or you have a close connection with people who have this problem.
Solution #2: after you have done customer discovery, pick one specific problem that the majority of people mentioned, build out your hypothesis and start doing customer discovery focused on validating your hypothesis.
Pitfall #2: Customer discovery to validate the solution - some folks have seen the problem in their previous companies or they experienced it themselves and they have a clear view of the possible solution. The trap that a lot of people are falling here into is creating a lot of bias around your solution and not around the problem. Usually, you will recognize such questions that the user will give a binary answer to, like for example “Would it be great if only you could do XYZ?”.
Solution #1: all your interview questions should focus on validating the existence and importance of the problem, not your solution. The best advice I can give is to read the book called TheMomTest.
Pandalign process
Let's delve into the definitive process of conducting customer discovery in these scenarios, breaking it down step by step:
1. Defining the Hypothesis: This challenging yet crucial step lays the groundwork for all subsequent work. First of all, we need to specify the concrete problem “is-state” and a specific person. Now try to add the desired outcome or “end-state”, focusing on the outcomes the user seeks. What helps usually here is to also think about where, when, and how frequently this problem occurs.
An important note: the outcome is not the solution.
Once you've pinpointed the problem and desired outcome, it's vital to understand the cost and price your potential users are willing to pay to resolve their problem. This cost can be monetary or non-monetary, encompassing the price they're already paying for an inadequate solution or the time spent addressing the issue.
2. Deepening Understanding: With your hypothesis in hand, explore platforms like LinkedIn to identify people matching your persona. Reach out for discussions, being careful not to come across as sales-driven. Instead, mention that you are doing research on a specific problem A for user like them and you value their input based on their experience. Depending on the personas 15-30-minute call length range works the best here.
Let’s play through one example: suppose you contact 100 people; expect around 20-40 to respond and schedule a call. The best way to schedule the call is to use tools like Calendly or Cal.com, which make it super easy to book a call with you and reduce the cognitive load.
3. Preparing for the Call: Armed with your hypothesis, craft an unbiased script for the interview. Remember, this script serves as a guide – your primary aim isn't to validate your solution but to understand if the individual matches your persona and has the problem you've identified. If this aligns, the next step is to delve into the value of resolving this problem for them.
During the interview, focus on being present and attentive, so the interviewee feels genuinely heard. Instead of noting down everything, jot down key quotes that will assist in later insight generation. For note-taking, you might use some tools like Fireflies, though I've honed my skills to the point where manual notes are often more effective. In the early days of Pandalign, I shared some notes from the calls with a close friend of mine and he wrote me back that this is one of the best notes from calls he has ever seen. I know he probably lied, but it was very nice to hear.
4. Repeating the Process: Continue this process until you've conducted 50 successful interviews that confirm both the persona and the problem. If you succeed with that - you have a green light to go into the next phase validating the solution. Pair with a great designer and try to nail the UX & UI. When ready start the new cycle with the people you already talked to and continue validating the problem.
Golden Rules
#1 Never talk to people you know well: You would probably ask me why and the answer is simple - they all lie to not make you feel bad. There are a lot of people who you can reach out to and don’t slack off the cold outreach, but once you nail it it becomes as simple as making a coffee.
#2 Never discuss the solution: it's off-limits. If asked, suggest a separate call to explore potential solutions. The willingness of a person to engage further about the solution is a strong indicator of the problem's significance to them. Analyze these calls and continually revisit and refine your hypothesis based on your findings.
#3 Referrals: End each call by asking for people they might know in their network who might be interested in discussing the problem. This approach helps expand your interview pipeline and build exponential growth that makes it easier to build stable outreach. Introductions are always more trusted than cold outreach.
I hope you enjoyed the read and this will help you to make your next customer discovery process a true success! Don’t forget to comment if you have any questions or experiences that you wan to share with our community.