Course 2.1: Customer Interviews | Building a Target Interview Subject List

2.1.  Building a Target Interview Subject List

Let’s recap. You know WHY customer interviews are important, you know WHO to ask, and you know HOW to plan your interviews.

As we discussed in Part One, you should conduct around 20 interviews. Any fewer and you won’t get enough perspective. The more people you interview, the more diversity in opinions, perspectives, and usage patterns you will hear.

Now just because you want to schedule 20 people, it doesn’t mean you only need to reach out to 20 people. The reality is, most people are going to say “No”.

I’ve found that for every 100 people I reach out to, I get about 30 responses back, and only 10 of those agree to an interview. So, if my goal is to have 20 interviews, I need to reach out to 200 people.

Now let’s talk about an Outreach approach. Start by creating what I like to call a “Target List” of people to reach out to.

If I want to interview existing customers, my company’s customer service team will know where to find them.

They’ll know which customers are facing specific challenges I’m researching.

For example, I’d reach out to my sales and customer research team and ask them to provide a list of customers that were easy to sell to.

Why? Because these “easy sells” likely have a very clear understanding of the problem your product solves and what benefits that your solution offers.

What if you don’t have any current customers? Or what if you want to hear from people who haven’t bought from you yet?

Then you’ll have to find prospective customers. But where do you look?

LinkedIn is my favorite place to look for potential subjects.

You search profiles with specific criteria, which is great. But even better is that the people you’re reaching out to will see your picture and where you work. That’s an instant trust factor -- and much better than an email from a stranger.

They’ll be much more likely to agree to an interview that way. Having trouble figuring out who to interview?

Reviewing your Ideal Customer Profile is a good starting point. Or if you don't have one, make a guess at who will be the right person for your product or whose problem are you trying to solve.

For example, let's say my ICP is It manager who oversees security at a mid-sized organization. Then I would search for IT manager, IT director, VP of Technology titles on Linkedin.

Don’t worry, in the next video, I’ll show you exactly how to do this.