Course 1.3: Customer Interviews | Planning Your Interview Questions

1.3.  Planning Your Interview Questions

Now it’s time to plan your questions.

I recommend breaking the interview process into 3 stages:

1. Introduction

2. Research stage

3. The wrap-up

Let’s talk about the introduction stage first. When starting an interview, I briefly introduce myself with something like,

“Hi, my name is Myk. I'm a founder of Publishnow. I reached out to you because I want to learn about how you manage content production and distribution.”

It doesn’t have to be too long -- just one sentence to set up the conversation. Then you want to build a bit of rapport.

Ask them some broad questions about their career, job responsibilities, team goals, and what their typical day looks like. I also like to ask what their most pressing challenges are. At the end of the day, it's a conversation and not a deposition.

Next comes the research stage.

This is where you focus on the specific problems you want to solve. So a great way to start the conversation is to ask the subject to tell you about the last time they encountered that particular problem.

Let’s go back to the content marketing example. Let’s say I’m researching a content marketing solution. I might ask people to tell me about the last time they had to produce a piece of content.

- What happened?

- How did the process go?

- Was anyone else involved in the process?

This last question helps me understand any capacity issues. I don’t want to just know about the problem. I want to know about all the different people who were involved in the process -- and who can influence it.

It’s also important to note that I’m asking about very specific instances. I’m not asking about what they think of the problem in an abstract sense.

Asking them to tell me about the last time they encountered the problem means they have to go back, remember a specific instance, and then reiterate the story, step-by-step.

That’s important because you get more real answers that way.

We all want to portray ourselves in different, better ways than we are.

So if we ask abstract questions like “what's your content marketing process?”, we might get answers that are made up on the fly, based on how people optimistically think they’d handle the problem. That’s not very helpful.

Another way to ask the question would be, “When you last wrote or produced an article, was it successful?” And then, follow up with, “If it was successful, how did you measure that?”

It shouldn’t be enough to have someone tell you they were successful in solving a problem. I also want to know what challenges they faced. And how they reported their success to their team.

I might dig deeper and ask if they had trouble coming up with a topic, how they researched the topic, or whether they had trouble sourcing images. I can even take things further by asking them to repeat the process out loud.

That tells me how they approached the problem-solving process and how their approach changed as a result. You also want to ask if their team plans to change their approach in the future.

For example, you can ask, “Do you feel comfortable with the process you used to solve your problem?

Are you looking to improve it in some way?” I like asking these questions because they make people think of what a perfect world looks like to them.

People aren’t always prepared for them, so they have to think about it.

I can then dig into things like, “In an ideal world, how would you want the content production process to work in your organization? What specific improvements would you like to see?”

This is also a great opportunity to get into their organization’s decision-making process.

A few of the specific questions I like to ask here are:

- Who in your organization is involved in the buying process? (or will be involved) Tell me about the last time you purchased a product.

- Who uses the product the most? (or who will be using it the most)

- Who was (or will be) responsible for making the final decision?

- What alternatives did you consider (or will you be considering)?

- How will you implement this solution?

Finally, depending on the person I’m interviewing, I might use this opportunity to learn more about where they hang out online.

For example, I’ll ask what they like to read, who they follow online, or what events they usually attend.

- Are there blogs, newsletters, or other industry publications they subscribe to?

- Are they active in any online groups or communities?

Not only are these great places to go for further insights, but they can also be great sources of future interview subjects.

I do want to emphasize here that the way you ask questions matters.

Again, I always try to get people to tell me about actual examples. It gives you more truthful information.

Plus, hearing people’s responses in story format gives you so much more context.

When people have to remember a specific example it moves from abstract and hypothetical to concrete actions and processes, which is more reliable data.

That’s important because direct answers aren’t going to get you context.

If you ask people a “yes” or “no” question, often, you’ll find that saying yes is much easier for people, even if it’s not necessarily true.

It’s also harder for you to dig in deeper to get more information using close-ended questions.

And finally, making people choose between extremes like 'yes' and 'no' makes it difficult for them to explain and provide context on complex topics.

Looking for success is important as well.

We’ve talked a lot about digging into problems, but looking for successes is just as meaningful.

It helps you figure out if your product can be used to replicate the same success for a larger audience.

So look for instances where your customer says something like, “Oh, you know what? We had this problem, but then we solved it in this amazing way that changed how we operate.”

Finally, do your best to leave your beliefs at the door and avoid asking leading questions.

I’ll give you an example here. If I was interviewing someone about content marketing software, what do you think would happen if I asked them, “It is so difficult to track content ROI, isn't it?”

That question has the answer in it, and it’s leading the subject to give me the answer I want to hear.

And as nice as that might feel, I’m not going to learn anything from it. So pay attention, and catch yourself before leading customers into confirming your pre-existing beliefs. The bulk of your conversation should be in the research phase.

When you are nearing the end of your time, briefly wrap up your conversation by thanking them for their time, and even asking if they know of anyone else in their organization you should talk to -- we’ll talk about this in more detail in an upcoming lesson.

So to recap, the conversation is conducted in 3 stages: Introduction, research, wrap-up. But how much time should your interviews take up?

We’ll talk about it in the next lesson where we go over structuring your interviews.

See you there.

Summary:

• Use "Tell us about the last time…." vs. what/who/how
• Don't expect to get direct answers
• Ask an open-ended question, don't ask close-ended questions.
• Look for problems to solve and successes to replicate.
• Leave your beliefs at the door, don't ask leading questions.
• Example: It is so difficult to track content ROI, isn't it?
• Create a uniform structure for customer interviews