Article · 12 min read

Get in the Van and Other Tips for Getting Meaningful Customer Feedback

Michael Sippey · First Round Review Free Intermediate

To say no to the right requests you need feedback you can trust, and this shows how to get it by watching customers rather than just taking their asks. It reinforces that observing the struggle tells you more than the feature name they hand you. Practical field technique for separating a stated want from a real need.

  • Watch what customers do, not only what they ask for
  • Get close to the actual struggle to find the real problem
  • Stated requests are a starting point for questions, not a spec
Open on review.firstround.com ↗

It answers 12 questions

  1. How do I talk to customers without them just telling me what I want to hear?
  2. What questions should I actually ask in a customer interview?
  3. How many customer interviews do I need before I trust the signal?
  4. Where do I find people to interview when I have zero audience?
  5. How do I say no to feature requests without losing customers?
  6. What's the difference between a customer saying they'll pay and actually pulling out a card, and how do I test the real one early?
  7. Should I do customer interviews live over a call, or is survey data good enough at the start?
  8. How do I run good discovery calls in India when the person keeps saying yes to be polite but never converts?
  9. I've done 20 interviews and every person described a slightly different problem. How do I know if there's a real pattern or just noise?
  10. How do I do user research when I'm building something nobody has seen before and can't describe what they want?
  11. What are the questions that quietly ruin an interview by leading the person to the answer I want?
  12. How many customer conversations should I do before I start building versus building a rough version to learn faster?

Read with it

  1. The single best thing ever written on customer conversations. It teaches you to ask about the customer's life and past... momtestbook.com Book · ~130 pages The Mom Test Rob Fitzpatrick
  2. A deep conversation on why direct questions fail and how story-based interviews surface real behaviour. Torres names the common... Lenny's Newsletter Podcast · ~75 min Teresa Torres on how to interview customers Lenny Rachitsky and Teresa Torres
  3. A YC partner turns 'talk to users' into a repeatable 5-question interview script you can use this afternoon. It's The Mom Test... YC Startup Library Video · ~25 min How to Talk to Users Eric Migicovsky (YC / founder of Pebble)
  4. A short, practical field guide to customer discovery: who to talk to, how to find them, and how many. Pairs perfectly with The... talkingtohumans.com Book · ~80 pages (free PDF available) Talking to Humans Giff Constable
  5. A step-by-step guide to running discovery when you have almost no data, aimed squarely at first-time founders. It is practical... First Round Review Article · 15 min read A Founder's Guide for Successful Early-Stage Customer Discovery Jeanette Mellinger
  6. The permission slip to recruit users by hand, do things manually, and deliver 'insanely great' experiences to your first few... paulgraham.com Essay · ~15 min read Do Things That Don't Scale Paul Graham
eChai Partner Brands The partnership →