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The Mom Test – How to talk to customers

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Re: The Mom Test – How to talk to customers

#11
post #9
post #8

Naming something "The Mom Test" in the current political environment is a choice.

Is "is a choice" something the kids are saying these days? Never heard that expression. At any rate, at first I was worried that this was a sexist-agist reference, but in fact it's not at all. "Mom" is just used to represent someone who doesn't want to hurt your feelings.

Yep. I thought the same thing originally, and then realized it's nothing of the sort. That I so quickly jumped to that assumption says more about me than the author :(

Re: The Mom Test – How to talk to customers

#13
post #4

Although not quite the same, this reminds me of a very simple trick many blind people are taught during training on how to navigate the city: Never ever ask "Is this line 4" if you want to know which tram just arrived. Ask "which line is this?" Simply because the first version will make many people answer "yeah yeah" without even looking. The second version forces them to actually answer your question with something…

Requiring a little effort makes quite a difference.

Case in point: https://youtube.com/watch?v=n3AGpvV7KLI

Re: The Mom Test – How to talk to customers

#14
post #7

Best book on early stage startups period. And it's barely 100 pages long. My favorite quote from it: “Someone should definitely make an X!” “Have you looked for an X?” “No, why?” “There are like 10 different kinds of X.” “Well I didn't really need it anyway.” Long story short, that person is a complainer, not a customer. They’re stuck in the la-la-land of imagining they’re the sort of person who finds clever ways to…

Exactly! I think it is q bit over 100 pages (140) but still really short. It was recommended so many times to me so I really wanted to make a short summary.

The thing with separating complainers from customer is a great learning as well. If you just see complainers maybe the problem isn't that important ;)

Re: The Mom Test – How to talk to customers

#15
post #4

Although not quite the same, this reminds me of a very simple trick many blind people are taught during training on how to navigate the city: Never ever ask "Is this line 4" if you want to know which tram just arrived. Ask "which line is this?" Simply because the first version will make many people answer "yeah yeah" without even looking. The second version forces them to actually answer your question with something…

Oh wow sounds terrible to lie to a blind person but makes totally sense.

Re: The Mom Test – How to talk to customers

#17
post #5

Nice read thanks! In the same vein of gathering good data and finding the resonating solution to customers problems, Small Data[1] by Martin Lindstrom is another great read with a sociological approach, focused on branding but nonetheless on entrepreneurship also. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Data

Looks really interesting! Added it to my list, thanks :-)

Re: The Mom Test – How to talk to customers

#19

The Mom Test, the entire book, is a couple hour read... honestly if you have any interest at all in selling or building (or simply work at a startup) it's worth reading the whole thing, and not a summarized recap... the book itself is summarized.

You're completely right thats what I say as well. If you're interested in this topic, read it it is barely 140 pages long. But I think a summary can be a good intro and a good learning for me as well :-)

Re: The Mom Test – How to talk to customers

#20
post #9
post #8

Naming something "The Mom Test" in the current political environment is a choice.

Is "is a choice" something the kids are saying these days? Never heard that expression. At any rate, at first I was worried that this was a sexist-agist reference, but in fact it's not at all. "Mom" is just used to represent someone who doesn't want to hurt your feelings.

Exactly in this case "Mom" just refers to a person who doesn't want to hurt your feelings and just tells you that every idea is awesome ;)
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