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I feel like getting customers to talk to me is the hardest part. Even when I have hundreds of people using an MVP for free, literally less than five would say a
by ilaksh 3y ago
I feel like getting customers to talk to me is the hardest part. Even when I have hundreds of people using an MVP for free, literally less than five would say anything in the Discord.
I feel like I could immediately build multiple great products using generative AI for specific communities. If I could just get three people from that community to tell me what they were trying to do and then try the solution I build.
But it seems like people just want to do the specific activity they are doing in the specific niche they are in. They don't want to do new things. So it seems like somehow it's a social problem not a technical one. I need to be inside of a community and observe their existing activities and insert something that just makes it easier. Without requiring them to think differently or try something new or go outside their niche.
I did do that last year and managed to make several hundred dollars on transaction fees multiple months in a row. That was a big win, for me. But it was a small niche and that dried up.
- simonswords82 3y agoPeople are busy. They have a million things vying for their attention. If you want feedback that badly, you need to ask them one at a time for feedback. Go to them, go network with them, have coffee with them, call them, email them directly.
- ilaksh 3y agoWell, everyone needs to have some level of feedback, it's not just me. That is a good suggestion though. I have tried messaging a few people today. They seem to be ignoring me. But it's a small sample so far. I will keep your suggestion in mind. I have a feeling that most are going to ignore me still but I assume it will be better than just only hoping people will write something in Discord.
- simonswords82 3y agoThanks for taking my suggestions onboard. I was trying to be positive. I do agree with your premise that obtaining customer feedback is hard. That's why you have to be relentless about it.
- ilaksh 3y agoActually one of the people did respond eventually. So for this effort, I'm at 50% response rate!
- jmchuster 3y agoIt's probably helpful to first get a sense of how much work it is to gather customer feedback. As an example, Qualtrics was getting single digit percent response rates, on a simple NPS survey (https://delighted.com/blog/average-survey-response-rate https://delighted.com/blog/average-survey-response-rate). If you're asking people to give you more detailed feedback, I'd imagine the hit rate might be even lower. Another data point, people who gather feedback professionally often offer customers $100 for an hour of their time.
- austhrow743 3y agoConventions and conferences is what you want. As a salesperson my problem with them has always been that people want to talk too much at them! Harder to tell who is serious. I'm not just talking about conventions and conferences that your target market attend and you/your competitors rent booths at. Attend ones where your target market is doing the selling from their owns booths. Obviously don't approach if they have their own prospects to talk to and back off if someone else approaches, but as long as you're doing that they'll take your ear off during their downtime.