Decision and expert interview

Magical guide about?#productmanagement . Article #42

This interview is conducted to make sure that the product can really solve a certain problem and the potential buyer is willing to pay for it.

The purpose of the decision interview?is to understand whether the customer will buy our product and how he will react to our product when we sell the product in a scaled manner. That is, the task is not to sell at any price, but to understand the match or not.

If the hypothesis of the problem is not “clearly refuted”, but there is no confidence in the viability of the idea and you want more clarity, then it is worth conducting a solution study.

With whom to spend

With those who participated in the interview about the problem.

Why conduct

Goals:

1. Confirm/deny compliance problem-solution — problem-solution fit — make sure that the conceived product solves the identified and confirmed problem of the client.
2. Test a prototype of a product or a ready-made solution on real users and
3. complement the vision of the problems associated with the product.
4. Determine the customer’s willingness to purchase your product or service.
5. To conduct such an interview, you will need an MVP, that is, a minimally viable product. (Important! The “MVP” does not have to be a working version of the product, but can be a prototype, layout, or even a presentation. Read more here.)

The results go straight to the product backlog, marketing and sales. Depends on the results:

• who will we offer to try the feature;
• what channels will we use to communicate with potential users of thisfeature (answers to questions about ways to get information);
• what we will write on the landing page (repeated responses of respondents with their vocabulary and formulations that evoke an emotional response);
• how will we talk about the feature in the blog, in the newsletter and to customers during the demo;
• which usage scenarios to show.

Stages of the Decision interview

1. Problem. Identify the problem that was identified in previous interviews — in an interview about the problem.
2. Offer. Describe the solution, tell us about it, present it, show it. Find out his strengths and weaknesses, and his opinion in general.
3. Agreement or sale. During the interview, you can agree on a purchase or further cooperation.

Example:

We have a segment with important and possibly frequency work. We have come up with a solution. It’s time to find out if customers will buy it and how to modify it so that they become.

A decision interview will help with this. It allows you to find out the real objections and change the product to eliminate them.

The most valuable thing in the whole decision interview is an attempt to sell — . If a person says “yes”, it is important to get confirmation by action right during the conversation. That is, he must put something significant on the line — money, time, reputation. In B2B, most likely, it will not be possible to close the deal immediately, but the interlocutor can write a letter to colleagues, arrange a meeting to discuss the product, sign a contract of intent.

If the respondent says “no” in response to an attempt to sell. And this happens in 9 out of 10 cases, then we ask — “Why?“ “What is missing?” In this way, we collect real objections and finalize the decision.

Bad Interview Questions

What do you think about our idea?

Would you buy the product? Are you willing to pay for this solution?

How much are you willing to pay?

Such questions may cause:

excessive delicacy: “Yes, yes, you are well done, everything is great!” — but in fact no.

Or, conversely, a defensive reaction: “Yes, I don’t need anything, everything is fine with me, leave me alone!”

The price issue is discussed in more detail below.

Good interview questions

Introductory phrases that you say at the beginning of any questions below:

1. What do you think…
2. In your opinion…
3. What do you think…

How the client was looking for the current solution (interview about the problem)

[context, problem, trigger]?At what point did you start looking for a solution?

[attraction channels]?Remember the moment when you studied solutions: how did you search for them, compare them, choose them?

[competitors in the market]?What other ways to solve the problem have you considered?

[main task]?Describe the changes that you expected from the activity that you wanted to start doing?

[money]?What budget did you have for this task?

How the customer bought the current solution (interview about the problem)

[context, problem, trigger]?What prompted you to start this activity at that moment?

[attraction channels]?Who or what helped you make the decision? Where did you turn for help?

[solution]?Tell us chronologically, how did you buy a new solution? What was interesting there at different stages?

[context]?Help me imagine a decision-making scene like in a movie.

Compliance of the proposed solution with the client’s expectations

Product features and ability to solve the problem:

• How could this product solve your problem?
• How useful can such a solution be for you?
• In what situations would you personally use this product?
• What advantages and disadvantages do you see in this solution?
• What are the weaknesses of the solution? What is he missing?
• How would you tell your friend about this product?

Checking the price, value and readiness to purchase

1. How much money do you love because this problem is not solved?

2. Does the proposed price correspond to the benefits of purchasing the product?

3. What price will correspond to the benefits that you will receive from the resulting solution? ((See Peter van Westendorp’s Pricing Method.)

4. Does your company have a budget for this area?

Real payment is the best test of readiness to purchase. More precisely, it is a purchase, but the sale is not an end in itself. You offer to make a purchase and other actions below to get honest feedback.

If you ask a person, even after showing the MVP, whether he will buy it when the MVP grows into a full-fledged product, it costs nothing for the person to lie and say “Yes” so as not to upset you. Therefore, it is important to make commitments:

• The best option is to make a sale here and now: Are you ready to buy now?
• If the client is not ready to buy the current product, then specify what is missing to buy: What functionality do we need to add so that you buy our product?
• What is missing so that you buy the product right away? And arrange to meet when it’s ready.
• Ask for an advance payment and make a pre-order, taking the money against a receipt, and arrange to meet when it is ready (financial obligations).
• Set a date for a new meeting (temporary commitments).
• Ask right now to distribute laudatory information about the product on the page in the social network (reputational obligations, “expensive” action).
• Ask to send three private messages to WhatsApp, Tlg, FB Messenger, Direct.Instagram;
• Arrange an acquaintance with the LPR (reputational obligations).
• Would you like to test the service as an “early follower”?

Do not try to sell (insist, convince, advertise) your product, be neutral. The goal is not to generate income, but to confirm readiness to buy and to verify compliance with the problem-solution.

It is recommended to avoid questions about the future, because such questions embellish reality. However, you can still ask customers from your segment for an interview or a survey about the basic quality of the product:

1. What minimum should there be in a product that solves the need that you chose to solve in order for you to buy it?
2. What can not be in a product that solves the need that you have chosen to solve so that you buy it?

Questions for the development of an existing product

Research the experience of using your product and identifying problems in it.

1. Tell us how you found out about our product?
2. How long have you been using it?
3. When was the last time you used it? How was it?
4. Why do you use the product? What do you like?
5. What are you not satisfied with in our product? What are his shortcomings?
6. How significant are these shortcomings?
7. How do these shortcomings affect your problem?
8. How can we fix these shortcomings?

The script of the decision interview

1. We pronounce the need and immerse the respondent in the context.
2. You’re a manager and you want to look stylish and modern, but you don’t have time to go shopping, right?
3. Tell us about the solution.

We have made an application that allows you to choose a wardrobe on the recommendation of experts. You upload a photo, you are shown pictures of women with a similar figure, you mark which bows you like and based on your preferences, experts select an image for you. You can buy things right away in the app.

3.?Ask questions

• Does it solve your need? If not, why not? If so, why?
• What strengths do you see in our solution?
• What weaknesses do you see in our solution?
• How is our solution worse/better than the competition?
• Is she ready to buy a monthly subscription for 999 rubles right now?

If so, why?

If not, why not? What is missing?

Mechanics of the decision interview

Actions showing compliance with the Problem/solution

B2C

• Money
• Is a public story about the product (for example, in social networks on your home page)

B2B

• Introduce a person who makes key decisions in the company
• Arrange a meeting with colleagues to discuss the purchase of a product
• Write a letter with a request to prepare a contract
• Sign agreements of intent

Typical errors

• Don’t try to sell
• Ask “do you like it? “ instead of “Will you buy now?”
• Believe words and not actions

Expert interview

An expert interview is a conversation with an industry specialist, which is one of the methods of marketing research.

Tasks of the expert interview

With the help of expert interviews, companies collect information about closed market segments and specific consumer groups, learn the opinion of a competent specialist, and also receive forecasts regarding the development of the industry. In some cases, to complete the picture, the interviewer interviews several experts with different points of view. Let’s see what tasks can be solved with the help of an expert interview:

• to test an existing hypothesis that cannot be confirmed or refuted byconducting a quantitative research method;
• identify problems related to the use of goods and their promotion;
• analyze the market situation;
• get industry development forecasts;
• identify promising areas for the development of goods and services.

Expert interviews are used for forecasting, research, planning and solving other marketing tasks. In the next section, you will find out what its pros and cons are.

Advantages and disadvantages of an expert interview

Based on the results of an expert interview, companies make changes to their marketing strategy, make strategic decisions to strengthen their positions in the market and increase competitiveness. Check out the benefits of this type of marketing research:

• helps to confirm or refute a certain hypothesis;
• provides an opportunity to learn the point of view of a professional from the outside;
• helps you quickly find answers to unexplored questions;
• allows you to find possible solutions to problems;
• helps to get ideas for the development of a niche or product;
• provides forecasts of probable developments in the market;
• helps to collect data to supplement the results of the study.

However, there are drawbacks to an expert interview:

• difficulties with finding an industry specialist;
• getting an expert’s subjective assessment;
• lack of guarantees of the accuracy of the information received;
• incomplete information may be obtained;
• The inability of the expert to clearly formulate thoughts, which leads to distortion of information.

To conduct a high-quality expert interview, the participation of an experienced interviewer is necessary. Otherwise, the study may come to a dead end, lead to incorrect interpretation of data, distortion of reality and other negative consequences. In order for an expert interview to bring maximum benefit, read the useful recommendations for conducting it.

How to conduct an expert interview

Preparation of an expert interview is a labor — intensive process that requires careful preparation of the interviewer and elaboration of questions. To get a qualitative study, it is important to take into account a number of factors. Let’s analyze a step-by-step plan for preparing an expert interview.

1. Set goals and objectives. Determine which problems need to be disclosed, which questions need to be answered, and what the information received will give the company.
2. Develop a scenario.?At this stage, determine the format of the interview (one-on-one conversation or group discussion), think over and formulate questions, prepare the necessary materials for the survey. Also analyze the factors that may influence the expert’s opinion and answers.
3. Think over organizational issues.?Find an expert, choose a venue and time, prepare an interviewer, as well as solve other tasks related to conducting interviews, collecting and storing information. When selecting a specialist, take into account the level of his expertise, objectivity and ability to argue thoughts.
4. Conduct an interview.?Collect the necessary information, get answers to questions, as well as an expert’s assessment and comments.
5. Process and analyze the results obtained.?Systematize the collected data, make an assessment and create a plan for further work based on them. If the interview was conducted with several specialists, then to summarize, output the common denominator of the survey or rely on the majority opinion.

Expert interviews are used as an additional method of marketing research or an independent way of obtaining information. The main thing when conducting a survey is to focus not on the personality of the specialist, but on the knowledge that can be obtained from him. Of course, a survey of one or more experts will not allow you to collect a large amount of data. Therefore, if you need to conduct more fundamental research, use an in-depth interview.

The logic of an expert interview

The essence of an expert interview is to quickly find the segment that has either the most severe pain or the greatest potential for buzz from your product among other segments. One interview with an expert can cost dozens of interviews with respondents when sorting through segment hypotheses.

You need experts who know the needs and behavior of a large number of your potential customers, that is, ideally, portraits of segments and their needs.

And you can immediately tell them about your technology, expertise and product idea, as they can drive this knowledge through their knowledge of the needs of the segments and more accurately direct you in the right direction.

Expert interview script

1.?Please tell me what is happening with the market now. What are the trends? What new players are emerging? What’s interesting about them?

2.?Which segments have severe pain now? Tell me more about each pain.

3.?[if it can’t select a segment] Do you know that now people have the most pain when solving this need? And can you single out any people who have it hurts more? Do you understand by what criterion they are combined?

4.?[if the qualifying factor cannot be distinguished] Can you describe the representatives of this segment? Let’s now enumerate them and try to find what unites them.

5.?What kind of product would you make now? Why him?

6.?[after the story about your product hypothesis, expertise and technology] Do you know which segment potentially needs such a product? Why him?What will be the main value for this segment?

7.?What needs to be improved in the product? Why is that?

8.?What is the best way to communicate it for different segments?

Conclusion

Today we have sorted out very interesting and complex elements of Custdev: A decision-making and expert interview. Using live examples, we saw how these methods can be used and improve our product. Next, we will consider equally useful elements such as a decision interview and an expert interview.