A Better Way to Source Product Development Ideas
There is an emphasis in the tech/product world to always be learning from your customers. Rightly so, countless products have been built without first asking, “Who wants this? Why do they want it? How do they want it?”
The main way that companies do this is to talk to their customers. This can take any number of shapes. Surveys, support conversations, user interviews, etc.
I’ll confess, I was a disciple and in some ways still am. When trying to get to the bottom of connecting users-to-problems, problems-to -solutions, solutions-to-products, I want to talk to the intended audience as much as is valuable. I love the practice of having those involved in the product development process spend a month doing customer support. No quicker way to get an acute sense of the pain you’re meant to resolve.
I also like sitting down with the sales folks. Who else has a better understanding of which current and/or desired features are moving the needle?
However, is it really the best way to source ideas for your next move?
I’m sure I’m not the only one who has been roadblocked by a project proposal by asking to validate it with the customers first. “Send out a survey, get some feedback before you start”.
Ask yourself this, how many times have you gotten one of those survey requests, and answered with care? The internet tells me the average response rate is 30%, though in my experience it is lower.
There are pitfalls along the way as well, was your question and survey design well done to get the desired data? Is it statistically significant? How often do you do surveys, are your customers suffering from survey fatigue? What kind of responses did you get back? Were they thoughtful, or trite?
In my experience, a typical survey may reveal 1–2 nuggets of insight, though it’s not clear that you wouldn’t have come across these without a survey.
There’s also the issue of assuming that your customers know the what, why, and how of your product. Customers are poor at envisioning things that don’t exist. They may have ideas about tweaks to existing design or processes but those don’t move the needle for your business. You work hard to make sure your product experience is seamless and intuitive, why should the customer know about the nuts and bolts?
There’s another downfall to customer feedback — it has little skin in the game. If a customer gives poor feedback (that is, unspecific, unactionable, etc) what’s your recourse? Lecture them about it, dump them? The feedback and suggestions you get from internal stakeholders have a lot more weight attached to it, and thus should be treated more valuably as well.
There’s an arrogance about this. Assuming that your customers care enough about you to fill out a survey for your sake and that they care enough about the product to know the nuances that you’re inquiring about. How often can you explain with detail why you behaved a certain way? The reasons are usually out of our sight and thus understanding. The real reasons are more simple, context and environment guide most of our decisions.
Do you know how your TV works? Can you explain why you turn to a certain channel as soon as you turn it on?
So stop asking your customers. There’s a better way: watch your customers, ask your team, and look at the market.
While there have been many an idea built for the sake of appeasing somebody’s own desires without the customer in mind, the reality is that your customers are rarely approaching the problem with the same level of care and insight as you.
When I was a freshman in high school, one of my classes was chosen for a pilot program where we received iTouches to use in class. The goal was two-fold, to see if this technology was worthwhile in the classroom and if it increased our technological proficiency.
In retrospect, that second goal was ridiculous. iTouches were consumer-facing technology, meant to be intuitive and simple to navigate. We learned nothing of how the technology worked, not the electrical engineering, the code, the material science.
This is how most customers interact with products, they know how it looks and feels on the surface. You, the creator, know how it works behind the scenes. The higher-ups and business analysts know the industry and market. Use that knowledge to go ahead and create your ideas for what you think the customer will like, then test your assumptions.
The practice of product analytics is already well-established, I’m not inventing something new here. What I’m advocating is a smarter approach that isn’t founded on customer feedback that is hard to get in the quantity and quality that will make a difference.
I’m also not here to diminish the value of the customer, of course their needs and wants are important, and smart companies are customer-focussed. You likely already know their pain points, their feedback may or not be original and may or may not be actionable.
Focus on the ideas you can (dis)prove through some brainstorming, thought experiments, or real experiments.
Value the feedback of your team who have a deep knowledge of your product, and have a more vested interest in its success than many customers.
Do some competitor analysis, look at adjacent markets, at other successful products and see if you can borrow from some of the hard work and good thinking that others have already done. Few ideas are truly original, tweaks on existing recipes, so don’t feel like you’re stealing IP. Everyone knows Instagram took from Snap when they introduced stories. Do you think they regret that move?
Customers are great, we need them and should strive to serve their goals, and address their pains. However, we can do a lot better than relying on inadequate feedback for driving product development.
