Conduct 50-100+ customer conversations before building
Extensive upfront research prevents building the wrong product. Spend 1-3 months on user research and customer conversations before writing code. For hard problems, lawyers and investors offer surprisingly useful 30-min calls for free.
When to use
Before committing to build any product. Especially critical for B2B, regulated industries, or complex problem spaces.
Don't do this
Jumping straight into building based on assumptions or a few casual conversations.
6 Founders Who Did This
Conduct 50-100 customer conversations before writing any code
Discovered unmet need through dozens of mock interview conversations with business students, consistently hearing they read WSJ out of obligation, not interest
Developed 'mini research sprint' framework of 5-8 highly focused conversations with narrow psychographic targeting, used across dozens of First Round portfolio companies
Conducted 90 expert interviews over 4 months across three persona types: fintech founders, financial services lawyers, and fintech investors. Used these conversations to validate the opportunity, understand regulatory requirements, and choose the sponsor bank model over an independent charter.
Spent 6 months on customer interviews and validation before writing code, testing multiple hypotheses through conversations with CTOs and founders
Sam Corcos conducted thousands of customer development calls, interviewing nearly every beta customer at midpoint and end of their program. The company treated each conversation as a learning opportunity, prioritizing customer feedback over scaling operations