Work smarter, not harder. Stop seeing the world through your product and instead see it from your target customers’ perspective.
It’s only natural as an entrepreneur or product owner to be focused on your product and vision; to see the world through the lens of what your product does.
Just pause for a moment and think about this: customers only care about outcomes – meeting their goals with the least effort, time, and cost. If you only see the world through your product filter, then you are not seeing it through the eyes of target customers. This is a major impediment to growing your business.
Seeing the world from your customers’ perspective means understanding their environment, seeing the barriers and constraints that truly impact them, knowing which problems they believe are worth solving and which are “below the line”, knowing the business metrics that matter, and what triggers them to take action rather than talk about taking action.
Imagine if you had this understanding. What would that mean for your product and your sales efforts? What product capabilities would you develop that drive meaningful value? And most importantly, think about how this customer knowledge could be used to accelerate product-market fit and grow your business.
So how do you stop seeing the world through a product filter and flip your perspective?
Set the awesomeness of your product aside and think with a beginner’s mind about the problem or need you are targeting. Ask yourself what detailed evidence are you using to guide your product plan and sales efforts?
One helpful exercise is to do a Concept Validation Review or revisit the one you have already done. You want a fully documented deep analysis of the problem/need. From this effort, critical insights will emerge with the supporting evidence needed to guide your decisions.
This primary research document should be a combination of what you know, information obtained from internet research, and of the utmost importance, insights from customer conversations used in a process often referred to as Customer Discovery.
To be specific, customer conversations are thoughtfully structured conversations for learning purposes with target prospects. These are not meetings to pitch your product. (Although, these types of conversations often lead to partnerships and product sales.) If you’re already deep into sales mode and not getting the expected results, think about restructuring sales conversations to make them learning based. In a sales scenario, prospects are often guarded about sharing information, but you will be surprised at the benefits of operating from a learning perspective.
Having taken this approach you will have deeply immersed yourself into your target customers’ world. You will be able to see both problems/needs and the surround from their perspective. You will have direct feedback on what your product should be and the value it delivers.
Business success requires smarts and luck. Tilt the equation in your favour.
A repeatable sales model and product/market fit may have been an elusive goal in the past, but we at the Evidology Group are committed to helping you get there. We’re confident our coaching, best practices, and templates can help you meet your sales and financing objectives, so contact us to find out how. We’ll review where you are, what we recommend for your immediate action-plan and set you off in the right direction. No cost. No commitment. If you want to take it further, we can even roll up our sleeves and join you on your journey.
As entrepreneurs, we know your time is a very precious commodity, so we take a pragmatic approach nudging you to work smarter, not harder by focusing on the right things at the right time.
Adam and Doug
www.evidologygroup.com
You know your product. We can help you sell it.
