Customer Discovery: What Do You Ask, with Justin Wilcox
Summary
TLDRIn this video, Justin Wilcox, founder of Nimbus Health, shares four customer discovery hacks to help startups avoid common pitfalls in customer development. He emphasizes the importance of not pitching during interviews, focusing on past and present questions, and listening to customers' stories to uncover their pain points. He provides a script for conducting interviews, highlighting the significance of asking 'why' multiple times to reach the core of customer needs and emotions.
Takeaways
- πΌ Justin Wilcox is the founder of Nimbus Health, a software company that automates medical record processing for hospitals.
- π He also runs a blog called Customer Dev Labs where he and other founders share their customer development experiences.
- π The focus of the talk is on four customer discovery hacks that Justin found difficult when starting with customer development.
- π« Rule one for interviewing is no pitching; the goal is to listen and learn from customers.
- π£οΈ Rule two is to ask about past and present experiences, not hypothetical future scenarios, to avoid misleading predictions.
- π€ The interview script starts with asking customers to tell a story about a recent problem they faced, which helps identify difficulties or annoyances.
- π§ The 'why was that hard' question is crucial but can be awkward; it's used to understand the core of the customer's problem.
- π The 'how do you solve this problem' question reveals whether the customer actively tries to solve the issue and if their current solution is satisfactory.
- π’ Pay attention to the emotions expressed by customers during the interview, as they can help connect and empathize with them.
- π Interviewing the same customer multiple times can provide new insights and a deeper understanding of their needs.
- π€ Asking 'why' five times can uncover the core emotions and motivations behind a customer's actions and the problems they face.
Q & A
What is the main purpose of Justin Wilcox's blog, Customer Dev Labs?
-The main purpose of Customer Dev Labs is to share customer development experiences by Justin Wilcox and other founders, to help others avoid the same pitfalls they encountered.
What are the four customer discovery hacks discussed in the transcript?
-The four customer discovery hacks discussed are: 1) setting up the interview, 2) understanding what to ask customers, 3) the importance of listening and not pitching during interviews, and 4) the specific questions to ask to gain insights into customer problems.
Why is it important not to pitch during customer interviews according to Justin?
-It's important not to pitch during customer interviews because it shifts the focus from learning and absorbing information to trying to sell a product, which can lead to misleading feedback and a lack of genuine understanding of the customer's problems.
What types of questions should be avoided when conducting customer interviews?
-Hypothetical future-oriented questions like 'would you ever' or 'will you ever' should be avoided as they tend to elicit predictions that are not reliable and can mislead the development process.
What is the first question Justin suggests asking customers in an interview?
-The first question suggested is an open-ended one asking customers to tell a story about the last time they encountered a specific problem context, such as being late to an appointment.
Why is asking 'why was that hard' considered a golden question in customer interviews?
-Asking 'why was that hard' is golden because it leads to understanding the core difficulty and emotion behind a customer's problem, which can be used to resonate with them when marketing a solution.
How does Justin recommend assessing if a customer is genuinely trying to solve a problem?
-Justin recommends assessing if a customer is genuinely trying to solve a problem by asking how they currently solve it and then inquiring why their current solution is not satisfactory.
What are the bonus points Justin suggests to enhance the customer interview process?
-The bonus points are: 1) noting the emotions expressed by the customer, 2) conducting the interview process multiple times to learn something new each time, and 3) asking 'why' five times to get to the core of the customer's motivations and difficulties.
What is the primary goal of the interview script provided by Justin?
-The primary goal of the interview script is to deeply understand the customer's problems, their emotions, and their current solutions to identify potential areas where a new product or service could provide value.
How does Justin suggest using the information gathered from customer interviews?
-Justin suggests using the information, including the customer's own words and emotions, to create marketing messages that resonate with them when it's time to pitch the solution.
Outlines
πΌ Customer Discovery Hacks
Justin Wilcox, founder of Nimbus Health, introduces himself and his two passions: his software company and his blog, Customer Dev Labs. The blog serves as a platform for founders to share their customer development experiences to help others avoid common pitfalls. The focus of the discussion is on four customer discovery hacks that Justin found challenging when starting with customer development. He emphasizes the importance of setting up interviews without pitching, focusing on listening to customers. He outlines ground rules for interviewing: no pitching, asking about past and present experiences, and avoiding hypothetical future questions. The script provided is designed to guide the interview process, starting with asking customers to tell a story about a recent problem they faced, digging deeper into the details, and understanding why certain aspects were hard for them.
π£οΈ Interviewing Techniques for Customer Insights
The second paragraph delves into the specifics of the interview script. It advises interviewers to pay attention to the emotions expressed by customers, as these can be crucial for connecting with them and empathizing with their experiences. The script suggests asking why a current solution is not satisfactory if the customer is still experiencing problems, indicating a real need that might be addressed better. The paragraph also offers bonus tips for enhancing the interview process: noting emotions, repeating the process to gain deeper insights, and asking 'why' multiple times to uncover the core issues and motivations. The advice concludes with encouraging the audience to write their own interview script, practice interviewing, and avoid pitching or hypothesizing about the future, focusing instead on past and present experiences.
Mindmap
Keywords
π‘Customer Development
π‘Nimbus Health
π‘Customer Dev Labs
π‘Interviewing
π‘No Pitching
π‘Past and Present Questions
π‘Problem Context
π‘Why Questions
π‘Emotions
π‘Solution Validation
π‘Five Whys
Highlights
Introduction to Justin Wilcox, founder of Nimbus Health and creator of Customer Dev Labs.
Purpose of Customer Dev Labs: sharing customer development experiences to avoid common pitfalls.
Topic of discussion: four customer discovery hacks to get started with customer development.
Importance of not pitching during customer interviews and focusing on listening.
Rule number one: No pitching, only listening to understand customer problems.
Rule number two: Ask about past and present, not future hypotheticals.
The reason behind avoiding future questions: they lead to unreliable predictions.
How to structure customer interviews: starting with open-ended questions about past experiences.
The significance of digging deeper when something interesting is mentioned by the customer.
Asking explicitly about the hardest part of a problem to understand customer pain points.
The awkward but crucial question: 'Why was that hard?' to get to the core of customer issues.
Using customer's own words to resonate when marketing solutions.
Inquiring about current problem-solving methods to assess if there's a real need for a solution.
The value of asking 'why' multiple times to uncover the core customer motivations.
Emphasizing the importance of noting customer emotions during interviews.
Advice on repeating the interview process multiple times to gain deeper insights.
Encouragement to practice the interview script with a neighbor to apply the learnings.
Invitation to visit customerdevlabs.com for more documented information.
Transcripts
[Music]
hey next attendees I'm Justin Wilcox I'm
the founder of nimbus Health a software
company where we help hospitals automate
medical record processing now that's
what I do for work but what I do for fun
is actually customer Dev Labs it's a
Blog where I and other Founders take our
customer development experiences and we
write them up and share them so that
other people don't fall into the same
traps that we did getting started
so if you like what we talk about today
definitely go check out the blog
speaking of which what we're talking
about today is four customer Discovery
hacks these are the four things that I
found hardest to get started with
customer development all right now that
we've got our interview set up we need
to figure out what are we going to ask
our customers and this is something that
I really struggled with when I started
customer development so that's why we
have hack number three what to ask so a
couple ground rules for interviewing
number one no pitching this is about
listening if you find yourself ever
proposing a part of your solution just
to get some feedback on it stop you're
pitching and we don't want to do that
the reason being as soon as you start
pitching your mind changes gears it goes
from learning and absorbing information
into trying to pitch something and sell
a product and this time is all about
learning so this is all about listening
to your customer all about listening to
their problems you'll have plenty of
time to pitch later okay rule number two
past and present question questions are
fantastic that's what we're going to ask
questions about the future like would
you ever or will youever hypothetical
questions those are no good we want to
ask questions like have you ever or tell
me about the last time things that have
happened in the past and are in the
present now the reason is if we ask
about future questions we're getting our
customers predictions and those are
basically useless and in fact they can
be worse than useless because if they
tell us something that we want to hear
would you ever pay $5 for blah blah blah
and they say yes we might mislead
ourselves into thinking we have a real
product the truth is they don't know the
answer to that question and it's going
to be misleading so we don't do it the
other reason is as soon as you're asking
would you or will you questions you're
probably starting to pitch a solution
and we don't want to do that okay so
with those ground rules in place let's
talk about what you ask your customers
the script that I use looks a little
something like this number one
tell me a story about the last time
problem context so for example tell me
about the last time you were late to an
appointment now the reason why we ask
this question first is because it's very
open-ended it's asking for a story and
it's asking our customer to sort of go
on whatever tangents they want what
we're looking for here are things that
are particularly difficult or annoying
for a customer so your job is to ask
this question listen intently and then
dig in when you find your customer talk
about something that's interesting to
you that you don't know about or you
don't fully understand dig in ask
questions why was that hard what was
annoying about that why is that that way
this is where you're going to spend most
of your time now if during this
conversation it's not obvious to you
what was the hardest part about this
context you're going to ask them
explicitly what was the hardest part
about this problem that you ran into
then they're going to tell you the
hardest part and this is exactly what we
want and now this question number three
this is golden it's also very awkward
you're going to ask them why was that
hard let me give you an example of why
it's going to be awkward so tell me
about the last time you were late oh you
know I was had to feed the dog and I had
to pick up my keys and I couldn't find
them and then I ran into traffic what
was the hardest part about it ah the
traffic was so annoying it was
frustrating and then I'm going to ask
why was that hard and they're going to
think of of course I know why that's
hard it's hard because it was
frustrating and we're going to ask and
then they're going to say you know why
it was hard cuz I had to drive across a
bridge and I was afraid it was going to
run out of gas and I was stuck in
traffic and we ask because the why is
exactly what we're going to pair it back
to our customers when it's time to go
pitch our solution we want to use our
customers own words when we Market to
them so that we know it will resonate so
in this case why was it hard afraid to
run out of gas we can say afraid to run
out of gas because you're running late
that might be the best marketing message
so this is really important even if it's
awkward to ask make sure you understand
why this was particularly hard number
four we're going to ask how do you solve
this problem now so I might ask how do
you solve this lateness problem now they
might say oh you know I just I'm not
late at all I just don't care I don't do
anything in that case we know this isn't
a real pain for our Customer because
they're not trying to solve the problem
if they are trying to solve the problem
you know I set my clocks forward fast
and and I um I try and get reminders
from Google and blah blah blah uh then
we can ask the next question which is
why is that solution not awesome if they
say oh you know what I know the clocks
are set fast and I just ignore the Remer
reminders we've got a problem they're
trying to solve so it's a real problem
and their solution is not awesome so
maybe we can solve it in a better way
all right so this is the outline for
your interview these are the basics
bonus points though if you can do any of
these three things number one emotions
take real note of the emotions your
customer expresses during the interview
frustration anger guilt greed happiness
whatever it is note those down because
those emotions that's how you're going
to connect with your customer when you
can empathize with your customer they
can feel that and that's how we're going
to actually move our
solution number two three Pat once you
get through this process you can start
all the way over at the beginning tell
me about another time you were late if
you can get through this process three
times you'll learn something new every
time and you'll really understand your
customer through and through finally
five wise if you can ask why five times
why was that hard why did you do it that
way why is the world like it is you will
understand the core Crux of why someone
is doing what they're doing and why it's
difficult if you ask five times you'll
get down to the core emotion and the
core motivation of what it is that
they're trying to solve
all right so that's my script and now
it's your turn go ahead and write your
version of this script and then go to a
neighbor and interview him or her when
you do make sure you're not pitching and
that you're always asking questions
about the past and the present and never
about the future good
luck so all this information is
documented up on customer devs. go check
it out I'm Justin Wilcox let me know
what you learn
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