Test-n-Tell - tiny apps, Big ideas

  End of last year, I published some thoughts on how gen AI adoption is changing the jobs of PMs. As many of us will look to change jobs this year, it's time to think about how AI is changing hiring.

  Welcome to the first chapter of my ongoing series on how to learn product management with the help of generative AI such as ChatGPT. This post is about the product discovery phase where you'll learn how to select the worthy problems to solve, how to conduct user and market research and how to create your product vision and strategy.

I am gonna tell you a secret. I don't like to do customer interviews. Yes, I know. After some many articles when I say it's the most important part of PMs job - I personally don't like to do them. Until I am actually doing them.

I was working on a product vision lately. I was struggling with it and I couldn’t understand why. Problem areas seemed to be obvious, product category and competitors were identifiable so as perfect customers. And yet the overall vision appeared blurry, too generic and well, quite dull.

Recruitment is hard. Doh! But why make it even harder for yourselves? Time and time again I see recruiters coming up with convoluted ways to "test" their candidates. Tests, assessments, business cases. And yet the "recruitment success" (in a wide definition of this term) is still pretty rare. But this post is not about the entire recruitment process, just a part of it - business cases.

Some time ago, an aspiring product manager asked me what books she should read. I gave a couple of recommendations for books that helped me massively to get into product management craft. I've read dozens of PM-related books, but the following five are probably the most essential read list for anyone who would like to get into product management or just understand what PMs do.

Biases. Biases are everywhere . I have many biases. So as you and your customers. How could you limit cognitive biases' influence on your user research?

The Customer Journey Study is a straightforward one. You ask your customers to go through your product and rate their satisfaction with every step. If you need a more detailed script - here it is.

Improving your customer's experience becomes easier when you have the right tools. One of the most useful tools to measure customer experience is the Customer Journey Map . It's a free and easy-to-use tool that would help you to know where you are when it comes to customer experience. Knowing your baseline is a pre-requisite to any improvement. To get you started even faster here is the free and simple template to use:

What a Broadway smash hit musical can teach us about customer interviews?

Do you know why clients choose your product? Or you're just happy it happens? Or they don't choose your product, and you don't know why? Learn why people switch between different solutions.

Do you know why people choose your product? Or you're just happy it happens? Or they don't choose your product, and you don't know why? Below is a simple way to find out.

"If you’ve been involved in user research that didn’t hurt at all, then I guarantee you did it wrong." writes Harry Brignull in the " 90 Percentof Everything ". 

When I plan a new customer research project I like to remind myself of the most important "rules". Here are those rules in a form of a small crib sheet.

If " 95 ways... " was not enough, here are few more ways for you to get customers for a product interview.

"I have this great idea I just don't know how to validate it, how and where to find my target customers?" Sounds familiar? Or another one: "We finally finished the MVP. Hooray! Now... how do we find our first customers?" On this blog you'll find a lot about how to make your customer research. Natural continuation of this topic is to write about how to get customers\users  to make a research. Luckily, Jason Evanish did exactly that. His article " 95 Ways to find your first customers for customer development or your first sale " is the best and the most complete overview of the methods to reach your target audience for research, marketing or sale purposes.

How do you know which product features your customers really want? Which features they cannot live without? Which features they would like? Which features will delight them? To find that out - try the "Kano model" analysis. Image credit "Kano model" is a product development and customer satisfaction theory. It was developed in the 80s by that man, Noriaki Kano ,  educator, lecturer, writer and consultant in the field of quality management.

One-to-One user interviews One to one conversation with a person (interview) is one of the easiest user research techniques. Sitting, talking to a person, what could be easier, right? No, not really. If you want to get real insight - you'll need to learn a lot before you master interviewing skills.