How to test if people will use (and pay for) your product

Talk to your customers

If you want to start selling your product, you need to talk with potential customers. You need to understand their needs, problems and desires. And then you need to show them how your product solves their problems and gives them the benefit they seek.

Selling is a skill that can be learned, but talking with people about your product is an art form. There are no shortcuts or tricks that will get you great results. You have to put in the time, effort and practice to get good at it.

Here are some tips that will help you get started:

1) Find people who match your target audience

2) Talk with them face-to-face or on the phone

3) Ask open-ended questions so they tell you what they think instead of giving you canned answers or “yes” or “no” responses

Once you come up with a hypothesis about what customers want, and then confirm or reject it using real-world data from actual customers as early as possible in the process.

It’s best not to create wireframes, design mockups, or write code until you have validated your hypothesis with actual paying users of the product or service.

Do Your Research

One of the biggest mistakes I see teams make over and over again is designing and building a product before they do the research. You don’t need to create a full product before testing it. We can learn from our customers at every stage of the process, and even pre-sell just the concept.

There’s a simple way to get a sense of whether or not your idea will resonate with people — and it doesn’t require you to build an app, or even have a product.

It’s called user experience research, and it involves having 5–8 conversations with potential users or customers that lets you see how people react to the concept of your product before you spend time and money building anything.

Here’s how to do it:

1. Create a list of your first ten customers. Why does this matter? Ten real customers show you that your product is no longer just an idea, but rather one that people actually want. If you can find ten, you can find a hundred, and then a thousand. First, you have to know where to find those ten customers. Likely you’ll already have a network that you can tap into that can help add the first names to your list. In addition to your network, you also need to think through new leads. Where do your target customers normally congregate on the Internet? Is there a specific industry your product caters to? If so, write down companies within that industry and figure out who to contact at them.
2. Set up a 30–60 minute meeting to ask some discovery questions and validate your assumptions. Some of these questions might sound like — What are some products/services you frequent regularly? Can you describe what your typical role and responsibilities are? What is the most time consuming part of your role?
3. Identify themes and commonalities among your conversations to strategize your products’ direction. If you can’t get people to pay for your product, it’s not a good idea to build it.

If you’ve already built a product, but people aren’t paying for it, don’t panic. You can still make money from your work if you’re willing to put in some effort. Before you spend months building a product, make sure there’s a customer base waiting for it. Use surveys and interviews to find out what people want and how much they’ll pay for it. If possible, get them to commit by signing up for a free trial or other limited offer that requires payment in order to continue using the service or software product you intend to sell them later on.

Build a Landing Page

Another great way to validate demand is to create a landing page and see if actual customers will sign up for your product.

There’s no need to create a perfect website at this point. You just need a page that communicates your product’s value and has some sort of KPI that you can measure based on a call to action. For example, how many potential customers are willing to share their email addresses to be notified when your product launches.

You can also use a landing page to see if customers will pay for your product. Have a section of the page reference pricing and then see how many people click through to get the pricing. This means that there is some level of interest in purchasing the product. Once they click you can then say that the product is launching soon and have them enter their email address. A landing page is a powerful way to measure demand validation, just be sure you have a message that sells your product, analytics tracking set up, and a clear way for potential customers to find your site.

Summary

User Research is a crucial part of your product testing. If you want to start selling your product, you need to talk with potential customers. You don’t need to create a full product before testing it. Landing pages are an easy way to get information about how well your message resonates with customers and how much they’re willing to spend. When you create one, you’ll be able to see how many people click through to your site, how many people make purchases, and what they’re interested in learning more about. So before you spend months building a product, make sure there’s a customer base waiting for it.