Bootstrap Hawaii Ep. 4 – How to do Customer Calls and Validate an Idea

Bootstrap Hawaii

Hey we’re on iTunes now!

This week, I’m continuing to do customer calls for Lesson Underground. I got another 4 calls with students in and also 3 calls with teachers. I talked about it in a previous episode, how the general rule of thumb for customer development / idea extraction / idea validation / whatever you want to call it is, you keep doing these calls until the answers start sounding the same.

This is starting to happen with my calls and its very exciting!

It’s beginning to look more and more like we are moving away from the initial marketplace idea for Lesson Underground and moving towards a concierge / matchmaking service for teachers and students.

The general idea I’m getting from students is:

1. They want to get better at X (X being whatever they’re working on. it varies but they all have something)

2. They want to find 1 teacher that they get along well with and is capable of helping them with their X and stick with that teacher for an extended period of time

3. They for the most part aren’t interesting in learning songs (D’oh!), but if they are, they want to use a song as a vehicle to get better at the ukulele. Meaning, learning techniques in a song that can be applied to many other songs.

4. They really don’t have any specific teachers in mind, they just want someone who is a good fit, and are open to having us use our expertise to recommend teachers

5. The main reason they wanted to try Skype lessons was they were not able to get the feedback they felt they needed from the video courses. Many felt lost and wanted some direction on what to work on next, or how to get to the next step.

I also began talking to teachers, and their input is just all over the place right now. This just means I need to talk to more teachers, which is good anyways because I need to build a bigger database of teachers to successfully service the needs of the students.

My general thoughts on the feedback from teachers is that different teachers are going to want different things. I know that sounds super general but basically teachers who already have their set system don’t want to deviate from their system and be encumbered by having to learn and use a new system in addition to what they already have. At the same time, new teachers are going to need more guidance and maybe help with things like billing etc.

Doing these calls has also given me a bunch of insight into how customers of UU are doing and what they’re struggling with with that service.

I’m still working on Ukulele Underground as well, and doing Lesson Underground sort of half and half with UU.

These calls really make me want to spend a month or so doing customer calls for UU maybe next month and from there the rest of the years video production schedule can be mapped out.

Tips for Idea Extraction / Customer Development

Some of the things I’ve learned from recently doing this.

1. Use warm leads if possible. If you don’t have warm leads, you can generate luke warm leads by using referrals or getting someone to allow you to use their name as a referral in email subject lines
2. Ideally, start talking to customers on the phone BEFORE you even have an idea. Your idea for your business should be based on the problems they talk about
3. If you already have an idea, don’t be married to it. Be willing to completely change your opinion and stance of what you think is good. Conduct the talks with an open mind and most importantly DON’T SELL.
4. A great line from Dane Maxwell is to use the Magic Wand question or some variation of it: “If I had a magic wand, and could wave it and make one of your problems disappear or get fixed instantly, what would you want to use it on?” This will get the person to stop trying to think and just say what is obviously bothering them the most.
5. If you discover, that the person isn’t a great fit, or there is no idea there, still try to be useful to that person even if it means giving business to some other company.

What’s next?

Still doing more customer calls until the end of the month. Trying to find more teachers to talk to for 2 reasons, 1. to nail down a revenue model and 2. Build that teacher database that we’re going to need to service students properly.

Until next week true believers!