Customers & Research

How do I run customer discovery as an Indian founder building for Indian users?

A starting point

The frameworks are global but the field is local: Indian buyers often say 'yes, nice' to your face and never pay, so watch what they do, not what they say. Get out of the metro bubble, meet users in their context, and probe willingness-to-pay hard, 'market-product fit' means understanding who and why before what and how.

Go deeper

Listen

🎧 Podcast
Free Beginner

How to Talk to Users with Gustaf Alstromer | Startup School

On Spotify by Y Combinator ~35 min

Why we picked it

The audio version of YC's user-interview classic, ideal for founders on the go. We include it as an alternate format for the same canonical, high-quality content.

  • Ask about current behaviour and pain, not opinions about your idea
  • Interpret feedback carefully, enthusiasm is not the same as demand
  • Talking to users is a lifelong founder habit, not a one-time phase
  • Convert what you hear into the smallest testable product
Listen on Spotify open.spotify.com →

Read

📄 Article
India Free Intermediate

Defining, Measuring And Solving Product-Market Fit Puzzle For Startups

From Inc42 by Inc42 ~15 min read

Why we picked it

A grounded India-specific feature with hard-won lessons from BigBasket, Razorpay, BrowserStack and Instamojo on understanding the Indian market before building. Inc42 is the reference publication for the Indian startup ecosystem.

  • Think 'market-product fit', understand who and why before what and how
  • Founders fail by obsessing over the product and ignoring what the market wants
  • Iterate frequently and expect to fail on most attempts
  • Track active users and churn, not vanity metrics like downloads
Open inc42.com →

People also ask

How do I talk to customers without them just telling me what I want to hear? Stop pitching and start interrogating their past. Ask about what they actually did last time the problem hit, what it cost them, and what they trie... Beginner 3 resources → What questions should I actually ask in a customer interview? Ask about the past and the concrete, not the future and the hypothetical. 'Walk me through the last time you dealt with X', 'what's the hardest par... Beginner 3 resources → How many customer interviews do I need before I trust the signal? There's no magic number, you're done when you can predict roughly the next answer before they say it. In practice that's usually 15-30 conversation... Intermediate 2 resources → Where do I find people to interview when I have zero audience? Start with the person you already know who has the problem, then ask each interviewee for two intros. Go where the customer already hangs out, nich... Beginner 2 resources → How do I show a prototype to users without biasing their reaction? Hand it over, give them a goal, and shut up. Don't narrate or explain, watch where they get stuck, what they ignore, and what they say out loud. Th... Intermediate 2 resources → How do I understand the competitive landscape for an Indian market specifically? Don't assume the US playbook maps onto India, pricing power, distribution, and willingness-to-pay are wildly different. Study who Indian customers ... Intermediate 2 resources →