The Customer-Driven Playbook

Book description

Despite the wide acceptance of Lean approaches and customer-development strategies, many product teams still have difficulty putting these principles into meaningful action. That’s where The Customer-Driven Playbook comes in. This practical guide provides a complete end-to-end process that will help you understand customers, identify their problems, conceptualize new ideas, and create fantastic products they’ll love.

To build successful products, you need to continually test your assumptions about your customers and the products you build. This book shows team leads, researchers, designers, and managers how to use the Hypothesis Progression Framework (HPF) to formulate, experiment with, and make sense of critical customer and product assumptions at every stage. With helpful tips, real-world examples, and complete guides, you’ll quickly learn how to turn Lean theory into action.

  • Collect and formulate your assumptions into hypotheses that can be tested to unlock meaningful insights
  • Conduct experiments to create a continual cadence of learning
  • Derive patterns and meaning from the feedback you’ve collected from customers
  • Improve your confidence when making strategic business and product decisions
  • Track the progression of your assumptions, hypotheses, early ideas, concepts, and product features with step-by-step playbooks
  • Improve customer satisfaction by creating a consistent feedback loop

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Table of contents

  1. Preface
    1. Who Can Use the Customer-Driven Playbook?
    2. How Is This Different from Other User-Centered Methodologies?
    3. How This Book Is Organized
    4. Website
    5. O’Reilly Safari
    6. How to Contact Us
  2. I. The Foundation
  3. 1. The Hypothesis Progression Framework and the Customer-Driven Cadence
    1. What Is the Hypothesis Progression Framework?
    2. The Customer-Driven Cadence
    3. Key Points
  4. 2. Formulating
    1. A Great Hypothesis Focuses on the Customer’s Limitations, Not Your Own
    2. Formulating Assumptions into Hypotheses
    3. The Parameters of the Hypothesis Progression Framework
      1. Type of Customers
      2. Job-to-Be-Done
      3. Problem
    4. Formulating a Discussion Guide
    5. Formulating Ideas
    6. Key Points
  5. 3. Experimenting
    1. Conducting a Successful Customer Interview
      1. Create a Screener
      2. Give Time for Responses
      3. Remain Positive
      4. Identify Roles During the Interview
      5. Debrief
    2. How Many Customers Do I Need to Validate a Hypothesis?
    3. Surveys
      1. Advantages
      2. Disadvantages
    4. Analytics
      1. Advantages
      2. Disadvantages
    5. Focus Groups
      1. Advantages
      2. Disadvantages
    6. Customer Visits
      1. Advantages
      2. Disadvantages
    7. Usability Tests
      1. Advantages
      2. Disadvantages
    8. How to Find Customers
    9. Getting the Customer’s Attention
      1. Update Your Online Profile
      2. Favor Depth over Breadth
      3. Reward Participation with “Exclusivity”
    10. Key Points
  6. 4. Sensemaking
    1. The Sensemaking Loop
      1. Data Sources
      2. Shoeboxes
      3. Evidence Files
      4. Schemas
      5. Stories
    2. Key Points
  7. 5. The Customer
    1. Formulating a Customer Hypothesis
      1. Types of Customers
      2. Motivation
      3. Job-to-Be-Done
    2. Key Points
  8. 6. The Problem
    1. Focusing on Customers’ Limitations
    2. How to Identify Customers’ Problems
    3. Formulating a Problem Hypothesis
    4. Avoiding Problems Not Worth Solving
    5. Key Points
  9. 7. The Concept
    1. The Power of Problem Framing
    2. Formulating Ideas
    3. How to Pick the Best Potential Opportunity
    4. Formulating a Concept Hypothesis
    5. Plotting Events Using a Storyboard
    6. Testing Your Concepts with Customers
    7. The Concept Value Test
      1. Unique Value Proposition
      2. Benefits
      3. Limitations
      4. Ratings
    8. Things to Consider While Creating a Concept Value Test
      1. Have an Opinion
    9. Recognize That Concept Value Tests Are Not Usability Tests
      1. Sharpen the Language Surrounding Your Concept
    10. Key Points
  10. 8. The Feature
    1. Formulating a Feature Hypothesis
    2. Talking with Customers About Your Features
    3. Formulating a Discussion Guide (with Tasks)
    4. Key Points
  11. 9. Using the Playbooks
    1. Experiment Types
    2. Materials
    3. Roles and Responsibilities
  12. II. The Playbooks
  13. 10. The Customer Playbook
    1. Formulating
      1. Formulating Customer Assumptions
      2. Formulating Customer Hypotheses
      3. Formulating a Discussion Guide
    2. Experimenting
      1. Preparing for a Customer Visit
      2. Conducting a Customer Visit
      3. Debriefing After Customer Visits
    3. Sensemaking
      1. Schematizing the Data
      2. Updating the Evidence File
      3. Creating and Sharing Your Stories
  14. 11. The Problem Playbook
    1. Formulating
      1. Formulating Problem Assumptions
      2. Formulating Problem Hypotheses
      3. Formulating a Discussion Guide
    2. Experimenting
      1. Preparing for the Interview
      2. Conducting the Interview
      3. Debriefing After Interviews
    3. Sensemaking
      1. Schematizing the Data
      2. Updating the Evidence File
      3. Creating and Sharing Your Stories
  15. 12. The Concept Playbook
    1. Formulating
      1. Formulating Ideas Using “How Might We?”
      2. Prioritizing Your Ideas Using the Impact/Effort Matrix
      3. Turning Ideas into Concepts
      4. Formulating the UVP, Benefits, and Limitations
      5. Plotting Events Using Storyboards
      6. Formulating a Discussion Guide for Talking with Customers
    2. Experimenting
      1. Preparing for the Concept Value Test
      2. Conducting the Concept Value Test
      3. Debriefing After the Concept Value Test
    3. Sensemaking
      1. Schematizing the Data
      2. Determining “Must Have” Benefits
      3. Updating the Evidence File
      4. Creating and Sharing Your Stories
  16. 13. The Feature Playbook
    1. Formulating
      1. Formulating Benefits into Features
      2. Prioritizing the Feature Work Using the Impact/Effort Matrix
      3. Formulating Feature Hypotheses
      4. Formulating Tasks
      5. Formulating a Testable Prototype
      6. Formulating a Discussion Guide
    2. Experimenting
      1. Preparing for the Usability Study
      2. Conducting the Usability Study
      3. Debriefing After Usability Studies
    3. Sensemaking
      1. Schematizing the Data
      2. Updating the Evidence File
      3. Creating and Sharing Your Stories
  17. A. Afterword
  18. B. References
  19. Index

Product information

  • Title: The Customer-Driven Playbook
  • Author(s): Travis Lowdermilk, Jessica Rich
  • Release date: June 2017
  • Publisher(s): O'Reilly Media, Inc.
  • ISBN: 9781491981276