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Ask HN: How to actually “talk to your customers”?

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Ask HN: How to actually “talk to your customers”?

#1

Post by cosmorocket »

I find this thread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14146850 very insightful and stressing some important common points in comments.

The most precious advice as I see is to “talk to your customers”.

How do I practically turn this advice into action?

Say, I have:

- an office with a computer and internet

- a map of the town and its suburbs I located in

- search engine to my service

- some details about the domain I’d like to work for

- zero contacts

Now, how do I actually talk to my potential customers? I can knock at doors of every office I find online and with a broad smile say a pitch then attack them with my questions? I don’t think it will work as I would like it to. More likely they will think I am trying to sell some bs and thus be quite skeptical and cold to me.

Should I try to approach bosses or common workers of companies?

Should I phone them, ask for an appointment, explain my goals and if they let me in, do the talk?

What is the right approach to talk to my potential customers?

Can you please share your experience and maybe books about how to do it properly?

Thanks!

Re: Ask HN: How to actually “talk to your customers”?

#2

Post by PaulHoule »

It depends a lot on what you are selling.

If you go to a small retail business (say a cafe) when it is not the peak hour, you might find the owner working there. It is usually not hard to get them in a conversation, many of them will talk your ear off. (Sometimes this even works for a supermarket or a large chain store.)

On that front, people usually like to be heard so if you do a lot of listening that takes the pressure off you. Often a good sales call is 90% or more listening to the customer talk.

I've gotten good prospects through LinkedIn and simlar means and have had very good luck (much better than 80%) at sending a message or email and getting an appointment for a phone call.

If I have any challenge here it is that there are people out there who really like to talk and talk and you can easily wind up having an absurd number of calls over a long period of time and get no sales. However, almost always in B2B sales you will need to make several calls over a period of 2-3 months. Big companies lke IBM can tolerate a sales process that runs longer that, but you can't.

Re: Ask HN: How to actually “talk to your customers”?

#3

Post by CyberFonic »

Well .... it really depends on what you are selling. You said service, but doing what? In what domain?

Ok, that wasn't helpful. So let me try to break it down, without knowing anything about what you are selling.

I will assume that your service is to solve some problem in a particular business domain. From that you can decide on who would have the problem you are solving and how critical it is for them. Hair on fire is good. Nicer typography on the menu - meh. Nevertheless, you can sketch your ideal customer. Potentially only a very small proportion of your town's business population is a possible prospect. Once you have identified the businesses, you could look at who in those businesses would be most motivated to do something about getting you to solve the problem(s) you have identified and are capable of solving.

Then you go an talk to the people you have identified. You listen more than you talk and refine your approach.

For a far more detailed approach you could read "Four Steps to Epiphany" by Steve Blank. Customer Development Method might be exactly what you need to help you maximise the productivity of your time when you are out of the office, talking with prospects.

If you provide some details about your business then some HNers might be able to give you specific advice.

Good Luck.

Re: Ask HN: How to actually “talk to your customers”?

#4

Post by kbyatnal »

I'm working on a consumer product. Here's what I do.

- Include an invite for a quick 10-15 minute chat in the welcome email (more people than you would think actually take up the offer)

- Ask them why they signed up (this is key to help you determine what problem people want you to solve)

- Ask them their biggest frustrations about the solution so far

And just take it from there.

Re: Ask HN: How to actually “talk to your customers”?

#6

Post by ayuvar »

kbyatnal wrote: post #4

I'm working on a consumer product. Here's what I do. - Include an invite for a quick 10-15 minute chat in the welcome email (more people than you would think actually take up the offer) - Ask them why they signed up (this is key to help you determine what problem people want you to solve) - Ask them their biggest frustrations about the solution so far And just take it from there.

How do you prioritize which 'frustrations' to work on?

Processing existing customer feedback has always been a problem even at large, established places I've worked for - chasing the new customer and adding features is always sexier than a general feeling of unease that requires a lot of prying to get to the root of.

Often in my experience most customers don't seem to know what the exact problem is, or can't put it into words, so having strategies to tease that out would also be appreciated.

Re: Ask HN: How to actually “talk to your customers”?

#8

Post by beamatronic »

kbyatnal wrote: post #4

I'm working on a consumer product. Here's what I do. - Include an invite for a quick 10-15 minute chat in the welcome email (more people than you would think actually take up the offer) - Ask them why they signed up (this is key to help you determine what problem people want you to solve) - Ask them their biggest frustrations about the solution so far And just take it from there.

Give them a $5 Starbucks card at the end as a thank-you.

Re: Ask HN: How to actually “talk to your customers”?

#9

Post by kolinko »

For me, when I was a tool for indie iOS devs

- still at the idea stage, I began talking to people online on iOS dev forums - iphonedevsdk forum, and reddit.com/r/ios /r/iphone, etc

- I asked my friends who I knew were devs. I live in Poland, and my target audience is mostly US, so their feedback was slightly limited, but still valuable, because I could talk to them in real life

- as soon as possible I went to San Francisco, and went to any meetup I could find through my contacts, on Meetup.com, and Startup Digest

- I try to follow news as closely as possible (e.g. there is iOS dev weekly newsletter), and look for opportunities to engage in the communication. Even without mentioning the name of my project (which is AppCodes.com -- a shameless plug here :D )

- Sometimes I write to bloggers and people who write about my subjects about something I work on, to honestly gather their feedback, and of course to ask if they want to know more about my project. It's always personal.

After a few years of doing various projects, I noticed that it almost always takes around 6 months for the word to go out that I do things, and people start coming back to me by themselves ("are you still doing X?"). With time, finding connections is easier, but not faster - it always takes exactly 6 months :)

Re: Ask HN: How to actually “talk to your customers”?

#10

Post by goatherders »

Cart is ahead of the horse. Getting out of the office to talk to potential customers has NOTHING to do with selling. It has to do with learning about the sector you THINK you want to be working in. In other words, you need to accept that your foundational knowledge is largely made up of information that made its way to you by going through your filter of preconceived notions and biases. My advice to my sales team (and to you) is to stop thinking about your needs (selling something, validating your product, etc.) and start thinking about discovering their needs. You do this by asking questions and listening.

People love to talk about themselves and their businesses. You will get a ton of positive response by picking up the phone (or sending emails) saying "I'm new to this sector and I've been learning everything I can online and through books and trade magazines. But I know I would learn more by talking to someone working in the field. Could I stop by Monday morning for 15 minutes and learn about your business. I'm interested in finding out how you came to even be in this business, what parts are enjoyable, and what parts are challenging. Thank you for your consideration."

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