Anyone else do a No-Code November? Here's how mine went.

At the beginning of the month, I made a commitment to step away from the product side of Guestboard.co, and return back to where we were 8 months ago - just talking to people. With one caveat:

No surveys, no chatbots, no happy/sadface rating scales.

Just phone calls, personalized emails, and in-person meetings over a coffee or beer. 📞📩🍺

Because we recently expanded Guestboard to be useful for more than just our initial market (wedding guests), I had a lot of new questions to ask, and people to talk to. (more on why we decided to go after multiple markets, here: https://medium.com/@p.vandendriesse/i-would-delete-my-facebook-if-it-wasnt-for-bf20cbc4a728)

I tracked down event planners, conference hosts, bachelor party bros, and Burning Man veterans.

I was able to watch them create an event, invite friends, and ask in-the-moment questions along the way – identifying friction points that you can't see easily from heat maps, etc. Having a working product is a whole new ball game, compared to the hypotheticals of the early days.

⭐ Hindsight tip: If you ARE in your early days, be sure you're keeping organized notes of who you're talking to, and their responses. These will VERY valuable down the road, when you can follow up and show how you've addressed/incorporated their feedback. It's a very easy sell, and they will feel like they contributed to the product (which they did).

Even if some responses weren't favorable, getting feedback from individual people was both calming and energizing. It helps confirm some suspisions, puts a nail in the coffin of others, and generally helps to shape what your REAL priorities are.

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How do YOU stop typing, and starting talking? 😄

Do you set aside large blocks of time to shift your focus, or do you just work it into your daily tasks?