Sit in your customers’ shoes for at least 30 minutes a day.
Looking at customer satisfaction metrics is great, but isn’t enough. We also really need to hear their voice and/or see them in their own environments; using your product. And this needs to be on a regular basis, not just saved for the periodic qualitative research effort.
Set time aside each day or a few days a week to sit in your customer’s shoes.
Here are some ways to think about it:
- Pick the customers that are most important (that could mean a lot of things depending on where you are in your lifecycle… newest customers, highest paying customers, angry customers, etc.) Don’t make this a massive thought or analytical exercise. Just be conscious in your choice.
- Pick a channel of communication where you’re most likely to find that customer. Again, don’t make this tough. If you only have one way to contact or find a customer, then you have your answer.
- Choose 2-3 questions you want to get answered. Be thoughtful about what you want to learn. This should take no more than 5 minutes. Examples: “What’s the one thing my customer would change to make their experience worthy of recommending to others?” “What is the one thing we could do to get you to use our product?” etc.
- Get started TODAY. Here are scrappy ways to get connected:
- Take a support call or listen into support calls over your lunch hour
- Read a customer email or feedback note… read a bunch over lunch or coffee
- Set up a “Follow Me Home” (more on this method later) that essentially has you watching a customer use your product…live. You can do this remotely if you don’t have a choice, but actually traveling to their home or place of business to watch them use your product is invaluable. Doing that at least 1X per month will make you a significantly more effective product leader!
- Sort and read through your open ended responses from your satisfaction or Net Promoter surveys (a bit more time consuming but so enlightening.)
- There are many other ways to do this…pick one and go with it. Test a few different ones until you feel good about the feedback your getting.
- The goal is to get qualitative insights around the key questions you are dealing with around the product. Adding the necessary context around your quantitative data.
Set an example for your team. The better you know your customer, the more effective at problem solving, and therefore, delighting, you’ll be.
Keep delighting!