

Ask HN: What questions to ask potential customers to validate idea? - codegeek

So I have been working on a prototype for an idea but have not talked to a single potential customer yet. Seeing the posts on HN about (e.g. how important it is to sell first, build later), I am wondering what kind of questions to ask to engage these potential customers. Some background info:<p>- THese potential customers could be hiring managers or recruiters in a very niche industry.<p>- I know these potential customers to an extent that I have dealt with them in the past related to my field.<p>- I am sure if I get them on the phone/email, most of them will respond.<p>So how do I go about it ? Any ideas ?
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kellros
I'd suggest you go read The Lean Startup, as this is the source for the
suggestions on HN.

You validate ideas by applying validated learning:

1\. Figure out what you want to learn (ex. an assumption: customers want this
product because it allows them to easily do x)

2\. Figure out how you will learn via metrics (ex. measure: how many customers
sign up based on advertising based on this assumption)

3\. Do what is required to gather the metrics. (ex. act: advertise based on
the assumption to gather metrics for analyses to validate your assumption).

Sort of sounds like Act/Track/Learn :)

The Lean Startup proposes that you approach a product by asking the following
questions:

1\. Is this product valuable to my customers?

2\. Would customers buy this product?

3\. Would customers buy this product from me?

4\. Can I build this product?

Point 1 & 2 refer to validating the viability of ideas, while 3 & 4 is more of
an introspection regarding availability of skills/resources/advantage etc.

Good luck!

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toumhi
It's quite a large topic, but the different steps could be :

1\. formulate the problem of what you're aiming to solve, and the customer
segments who you think have this problem (lean canvas / business model canvas
can help you there)

2\. ask questions to people part of your chosen customer segments and verify
they have the problem

3\. create a solution (MVP) to solve this problem

4\. demo it to them and verify it solves the problem in a way that makes them
pay :-)

Ash Maurya goes into a lot of details about this process in "Running Lean"
(highly recommended).

The general idea is to test assumptions to convert them from hypotheses to
facts, using a loop of build->measure->learn.

