Steve Blank

How Do I Know If I Have The Right Customers? 2 Minutes to Find Out

6 Responses

1. 

   Dan Thomas, on November 3, 2014 at 6:50 am said:

   I recently took a short course at the Stanford d.school where we designed a new service and tested it. We only had time to test it on two groups of four customers. One group loved our service, the other didn’t. There was nothing in the demographics of the two groups to distinguish one group from the other. It is easy to conceive that we could do a sample of “X” and get the wrong answer.

   One way to deal with this issue is to keep track of the people who like the product/service in the small sample and go back to learn more about them in a second interview. Then, perhaps, we can find more like them. Unfortunately, keeping track and getting a second interview is sometimes difficult to do.

   What other ways are there to avoid getting a “false positive” or “false negative” answer from the research?

   Thanks for your help.

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2. 

   Paul Durant, on November 3, 2014 at 2:17 pm said:

   What I’m trying to figure out in a start-up mode is what in hell can an eighty three year-old who believes in your principles do? I’m sick of the lip services and “sorry for you, man” smiles.

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3. 

   brlhome, on November 5, 2014 at 8:49 pm said:

   Reblogged this on BRL MUSIC.

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4. 

   Lilia Tovbin, on November 10, 2014 at 12:08 pm said:

   The title of the post/video is misleading. I thought “there is such a thing as wrong customers? let me see what the deal is” and then realized that both post and video are referring to PROSPECTIVE customers – people who actually give you feedback but have not become your customers (paid you or signed up for your free service).

   The topic about the “right customers” would be an interesting one. Someone who is just starting out might thing there is no such thing as wrong customer, but of course the reality is that there are certain type of customers you just don’t want to deal with – those that may pay little, hassle for discounts or freebies, and/or cost you more in support or customer service time. Perhaps a topic for another day/post.

   Is it just me or the video seems to state the obvious? Judging by the number and quality of comments left I assume I am not the only one who found this of little value.

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5. 

   Ashley Khan, on November 11, 2014 at 8:41 am said:

   Awesome video. I think the interesting thing is that Business 2 Business takes a shorter time yet yields higher ROTI. Business 2 Consumer is a very risky game to play whereas Business 2 Business can give you assurance of a sustainble business model. For example if you are creating an app for $0.99 you can’t exactly hard sell it for 20 minutes a pop as this would return you $3 an hour minus expenses whereas if you’re selling high tech software that costs $30,000 it’s a diff story. B2B all the way baby!

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6. 

   LeahDrayer, on December 19, 2014 at 7:19 am said:

   Awesome video! Very informative.

   Doing the right type of research is so important and I think you highlighted that point extremely well in your video. Not enough people talk about the importance of quality research and data.

   Thank you!

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