The Entrepreneur's Minute Blog
Category: Customer Value
When you have the honor of talking with a customer about their needs, don’t try to sell them on your product idea. Instead, ask an open ended question about how they get through their day. Then shut up. Follow the “ask ‘why’ five times” rule to really get to why they would consider buying another solution.
In all things, the best interviews are when the other party does most of the talking.
Features are what the product does. Consequences are what the product let’s you do. Values are why all this is important. In the moment, all buying decisions are emotional. You need to understand those emotional drivers and make sure your product or service touches those drivers.
There’s only ONE way to do that. Talk to your customers.
Read “Startup: The Complete Handbook for Launching a Company for Less” by Elizabeth Edwards
Know Thy Customer.
Never deliver the perfect product. It will be too expensive and take too long. Even if you do a lot of market validation, the only way to know how the market will respond is to put your product in their hands as soon as possible.
A good strategy is to target essential features from your market validation, launch the product and get feedback and iterate quickly.
There are plenty of people that make a living telling us what we are all thinking. There are still more that tell us what is coming and what is dead. They have to get people to listen or read what they have to say. They don’t have to be right.
The opinion that really counts is the customer’s. If you listen to what they need and respond to what they tell you, they will be more likely to choose your solution over the others available. Then all the industry “geniuses” will be talking about you.
Everyday, you should ask yourself, “where is my customer going?” That’s where the future is.
Get your product into the hands of customers as soon as possible. Engineers, by nature will tweak the design until it’s perfect. If you wait, you could spend a lot of time and money to find out customers won’t pay for it, or worse, you’ll miss your market opportunity altogether.
If your idea solves a big problem, chance are that someone else is trying to solve it too. Don’t let them beat you to your customers. Release the product when it’s just good enough. Your customers will help you with the rest.
Knowing what customers want before they do is an amazing talent. The iPod was not the first portable music player, nor did it have the most “features”. But it changed the world. Few people knew what the iPad was when it hit the market. It was a pretty expensive “electronic book reader”. And yet it is changing the world.
Not everything Apple does is a run away hit but the batting average is off the chart.
Value proposition is about solving problems in a market at a price customers are willing to pay. Apple has changed that formula to include the concept of customer delight. Therein, lies the secret.
“Patronum vestra” (know your customer)
You have to start early with customers. It’s better to consult with them, even before you start developing the product. Then let them beta test for you. Find out the top five things they want the most and target those.
Loyalty takes time and several interactions. Every web site view, every support call, every coffee chat, every site visit… all these things build relationship. The researcher does these things when there’s time. For researchers, there’s never time.
The CEO makes time, takes the call, buys the coffee.
Talk to five customers a week… for a start.
Read “Blueprint To A Billion” by David Thomson
The opinion that counts the most is the customer’s. Don’t run with the pack. “Me Too” business models slug it out in the mud. Find a need that is unmet and one that customers are ready to pay for.
Be different. Be better.
Low Cost Provider is a good business model but only if you have a significant competitive advantage in cost. Mature markets always compete on price until technology changes the game.
Better to compete on value. Solve a big problem in a big market. The iPod was not the first MP3 player. Nor did it enter the market as the cheapest. It cost $300 and in two years, it captured 92% market share. It wasn’t perfect. It didn’t have more features. It had three things:
But it had one big thing… it was cool!
People like cool. People paid for cool. A lot of people.
Read “Duct Tape Marketing” by John Jantsch
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