Customer discovery interviews are used to build a deep understanding of a problem space and identify potential opportunities. They are broad and technology agnostic. Typically they explore the behaviors, attitudes and experiences of people within the context of a problem space. They do not explore solutions to problems or evaluate hypotheses, instead focus on generating open-ended insight on the context of the problem.
What product should we build?
What problems can we solve for people?
What are the opportunities?
Understand the problem to be solved and potential opportunities
Gather evidence that the problem space exists and is worth solving
Enables shared vision on what the problem is and why it’s important to be solved
Will not evaluate specific solutions to problems, instead considering using an evaluative interview.
Sample size will be small due to the qualitative nature of interviews. Consider pairing interviews with a survey to backup your findings with quantitative data.
Interview participants will be recalling from their memory of the problem space. Consider an observational method such as field studies to witness the problem first-hand.
