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Idea: "Talk to you users", a podcast. Would you listen?

🎙️ Idea: A podcast called 'Talk to your users'

• LIVE examples of a founder validating product/ideas
• How to/how not to do it

If this gets enough traction, I'll do it. Would you listen?

Situation: the classic startup advice always says "talk to your users" (Paul Graham on Twitter, just one random example)

Problem: Ok, any practical examples? I don't mean theory, I mean me listening to founder X talk to user Y. With good AND bad examples


##Full story

You'll always hear 'talk to your users' in the top 5 Startup advice. But I couldn't find too many live examples of this piece of advice. There Robert Fitzpatrick's "Mom Test" book which is great. But what about the actual calls of founders talking to users?

  • How does it sound when a founder UNCOVERS a product idea out of a convo?
  • How do you do it well?
  • How to NOT do it?
  • How does it feel when there's an AHA moment for the founder?
  • Where's a live example of asking for validation?
  • Where's a live example of non-leading questions?
  • How tf do you even start the conversation? Do you reveal your idea at the beginning/mid/end?
  • And hey... really now — how does a useless conversation sound like?

So many questions. But I want to record mine.

If I document user conversations for a product,a nd the product becomes a $1M+ ARR business, having documented those conversations will be 💸💸💸💸💸

I wish I could listen to Jason Cohen's conversations with users who, after selling 2 companies, had this new idea. But because he couldn't get enough in pre-sales, he dropped it (imagine how hard that was)

Then he started WPEngine pre-sold it to about $2k MRR, and built it. I wish I could hear conversations for BOTH ideas: WPEngine and the one he dropped.


So I'll be doing it, if the traction is there.

A podcast called "Talk to your users". I'll be having these calls anyway, so (with consent) I'll record them, and it's a 2-in-1:

  • 📈 If I do a good job → they'll be public lessons for others on how to do it
  • 📉 If I do a bad job → they'll
  • • Show public progress (from bad → good)
  • • Show you an example of how not to do it
  • • Most importantly: it'll be a way to have others (you guys) tell me that it's bad (As opposed to me having 'bad' conversations, but not knowing)

Would you listen?

##EDIT:

Given the feedback I made this form so I can update you guys. I made the artwork really quick (based on another project of mine's artwork) and recorded a quick trailer: https://anchor.fm/talktoyourusers (iTunes was nice and approved it within minutes... wow? didn't know that's possible)

  1. 4

    I have listened to recordings of someone "getting out of the building" and interviewing people, and it was fantastic. Nothing like real-world examples to learn from.

    But, those couple of examples were enough for me to know "ah, ok that's how it's done". I can then get on with my own interviews. It's not something I'd keep watching/listening to again and again.

    1. 1

      Thx Farez. Yep I get why you wouldn't listen again and again. And yep, it'd be the type of stuff that, if you listen, you have to eventually drop.

      But I'm interested bcs you said you'll be listening to it in the first place! Thank you

      1. 1

        Cool! Yes, a real world example is definitely useful.

        1. 1

          Copying here what I added as a LE: given the feedback from here+other communities, I made this form so I can update you guys.

          I made the artwork really quick (based on another project of mine's artwork) and recorded a quick trailer: (iTunes was nice and approved it within minutes... wow? didn't know that's possible)

  2. 1

    I would definitely listen to something like this. Information could be very valuable as well as interesting!

    1. 1

      Copying here what I added as a LE: given the feedback from here+other communities, I made this form so I can update you guys.

      I made the artwork really quick (based on another project of mine's artwork) and recorded a quick trailer: (iTunes was nice and approved it within minutes... wow? didn't know that's possible)

  3. 1

    I think this will be valuable. But as long as the content is genuine and the founders are being honest. Not just saying generic things that people want to hear.

    1. 1

      I share many 'private' company stuff in public, so being honest is a must in these kind of convos!

      Copying here what I added as a LE: given the feedback from here+other communities, I made this form so I can update you guys.

      I made the artwork really quick (based on another project of mine's artwork) and recorded a quick trailer: (iTunes was nice and approved it within minutes... wow? didn't know that's possible)

  4. 1

    For me it's less about the actual conversations with customers. (Those could be interesting, but the difference between hearing the actual conversation vs. hearing a summary of the conversation isn't so great for me. Plus I imagine it's hard to get permission to broadcast conversations, especially with people who are not interested in your idea.) What I'd like is to see the process from the initial idea conception, to the plan for validating it, to (a summary of) the conversations with potential users, to the decision about whether it was validated or not. So I'd be more interested in hearing a conversation between the indie hacker and, say, a mentor, about whether an idea seems worth validation, and making a plan for that validation, then hearing about how that plan went and what decisions were made. For me personally, it's not hard/mysterious to know what I'd ask once I'm in a conversation with someone. What's hard/mysterious is going from an idea to a plan for exactly how to validate it, whom to talk to, and how to contact them and get them to agree to a conversation, and then making a go/no-go decision based on that. I'd be especially interested in cases where it's not so easy to know how to reach out to the right people. In cases like yours, you can ask the question in a highly active forum, and you have the option of just making an episode and seeing how many downloads it gets. In other cases, it might require challenging cold calling. I'd like to hear about those harder ones.

  5. 1

    I would totally listen to it. A post-conversation breakdown/analysis would be great

    1. 1

      Copying here what I added as a LE: given the feedback from here+other communities, I made this form so I can update you guys.

      I made the artwork really quick (based on another project of mine's artwork) and recorded a quick trailer: (iTunes was nice and approved it within minutes... wow? didn't know that's possible)

    1. 1

      Copying here what I added as a LE: given the feedback from here+other communities, I made this form so I can update you guys.

      I made the artwork really quick (based on another project of mine's artwork) and recorded a quick trailer: (iTunes was nice and approved it within minutes... wow? didn't know that's possible)

    2. 1

      Thank you Bobby. Question: What would make this so good you'd want to share it with others?

  6. 1

    Let's talk about how to validate the podcast idea.

    It's either the non-mom-test-compliant "would you listen?" and writing a post on IH that probably took an hour to write.

    Or it's simply making the first podcast episode in two hours and getting real user feedback on a real product.

    I'd choose the second every time.

  7. 1

    Yes! Yes! Yes! This will be hugely, if pretty messy initially. Like all ventures, it’s about the execution- but I am excited about this existing

    1. 1

      Hmm, interesting, thank you Saq. Question: What would make this so good you'd want to share it with others?

      1. 1

        It’s hard to say exactly. If one could have real recorded conversations of founder-customer conversation overlayed with a coach going through it and giving feedback to the founder, I’d easily share it

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