Customer Interviews eBook

8/10/2019 Customer Interviews eBook

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Have You Talkedto YourCustomers

Lately?A 7-Step Guide to EnterpriseCustomer Interviews.

DIGITAL TELEPATHY


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Table of Contents00.

INT R O DUCT IO N

01.BUILD YO UR T EAM

02.CR EAT E A R ESEAR CH PLAN

03.NAR R O W YO UR FO CUS

04.R ECR UIT PAR T ICIPANT S

05.CO NDUCT INT ER VIEWS

06.SYNT HESIZ E R ESU LTS

07.SHAR E INSIG HT S


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Introduction

Talking to your customers is the best

possible way to validate your assumptions.

The primary difference between a customer and a user is

that a customer gives you money. If youre interested in gaining

powerful insights about purchase triggers then read on!

Customer interviews are a powerful tool for discovering what

buyers need to make a purchase decision. These can pair well

with user interviews that may inform your product roadmap.

Consider sharing this eBook with others to ensure a

high-level of involvement from your core project team.


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Build TheRight Team

Cross-functional representation is

essential to your success.

Bring in team members from Product Marketing,

Product Management, Design, and Development.

Including the right people early on will keep

your project on track and increase buy-in to the

recommendations that come from the interviews.

Since your hopeful team members are likely to

be very busy and have other responsibilities,

be sure to communicate the time commitment

when recruiting for this project.


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Write aResearchPlanAgreement on goals will ensure a

smooth process and improve results.

A research plan will help your team communicate the

purpose of the interviews to outside stakeholders and

keep you on track during the process.

If youve previously created

proto-personasthen you probably alreadyhave many assumptions documented.

But you know what ass uming does, right?

VALIDATING ASSUMPTION S SHOULD ALWAYS BE

A P R I MAR Y GO AL O F CU S T O MER I N T ER V I EWS .

Hypothesis:

Assumptions:
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NarrowYourFocus

Refine your research plan so you

arent asking impossible questions

or undertaking a project with no

real value.

How do you intend on applying your research? Is the

output a new release of features, an updated persona

list, or a revised editorial calendar?

Be honest. Your goals and questions must

facilitate your intended output.

?

?

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KEEP YOUR RESEARCH FOCUSED BY MAPPING

INTERVIEW QUESTIONS TO GOALS.

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?

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Goals


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Recruit Participants

Proper screening will reduce wasted time and increase interview quality.

You are spending considerable human capital to

conduct these interviews, and you may even be

paying participants.

Whether or not you have an existing database of

customers, you should still screen participants to

find people who best match the use-case youre

trying to validate.


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Recruit Participants

Write a screener

Every question in your screenermust have a single purpose: to

screen out participants you dont

want. Put the questions that are

most likely to screen people out

at the start of the survey and

work your way down.

Distribute your screener

You may need to distribute

your screener to dozens

(even hundreds) of people to

find a sample size of willing

and qualifiedparticipants.

Aim for 5 or 6 people per

round of interviews.

Confirm and schedule interviews

These discussions may require a

Non-Disclosure Agreement or other

forms of legal protection for your

company or the participants. Take

care of legalities first. Then

schedule interviews in-person,

online, or however.

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KEEP T HIS M ANT R A: IF I

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SO M ET HING DIFFER ENT ?

A R EM INDER PHO NE CALL T HE

DAY BEFORE WILL HELP

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DONTs

DOs

Start off easy by asking questions about

their background to build a rapport. Get specific on events and scenarios.

Ask open-ended questions about

goals and experiences.

Mix methods: listen andwatch.

Allow for tangential discussion.

Talk to YourCustomers

Customer interviews should be a

dialogue not an interrogation.

Have a conversation, dont follow a script.

Facilitate a conversation by creating a discussionguide that includes the types of questions youll

ask along with the topics you hope to cover.

Ask leading questions.

Ask about the future.

Correct what participants say. You

want to learn their story, not how

well they conform to yours.

Disclose your hypothesis or what

you need to learn to do your job.

Let people design the product... thats

your job. If you get a feature suggestion,

simply ask How would that help you?

to understand the underlying need.


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Synthesizethe Results

This is the time for reflection,summarization, and comparison.

The goal is to identify common traits and behaviors

among the customers you interviewed, and plot

your customers along a spectrum line. For example:

technical/non-technical, novice/expert,non-funded/funded, lazy/ambitious.

This exercise will uncover patterns. Some

individuals will be clustered together across multiple

spectrums congratulations you have a persona!


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Share YourInsights

Give Customer X a face and name.

Visualize the results of your customer research in a

deck or a poster. A well-designed document can help

to rally your entire organization behind a customers

needs and wants.

Approaching business challenges with the

customers perspective in mind will help you

make decisions that are better for business.


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Customer Interviews eBook