Podcast appearances and mentions of cindy alvarez

Stepping into the world of customer development can be daunting, especially when you're unsure what to ask or how to approach potential users without a finished product.  However, Cindy Alvarez, author of "Lean Customer Development" and Director of UX for PowerPoint, believes embracing these uncertainties is the key to successful product development.  In this episode, Cindy explains why this initial discomfort is normal and essential for innovation. Highlights include: Why People Hesitate to Do Customer Development Interviews? (01:40), How to Design Your Interview Process (25:57), And more… Are you looking to create repeatable, scalable, and predictable revenue? We can help! ► https://predictable.fm/get-growth

Benvenuti nel podcast di Product Heroes!Il punto di riferimento in Italia per il product management, in ogni puntata potrai trovare tanti consigli utili per costruire, lanciare e muovere le metriche del tuo prodotto!Vuoi migliorare le tue abilità o iniziare a muovere i primi passi nel fantastico mondo del Product Management?Visita il nostro sito e scopri il nostro Master!

You'll discover the secrets behind the massive global exposure and recognition achieved by companies like Twitter and individuals like Elon Musk. Our guests are two PR experts, Bob and DeAnna. In this episode, we take a deep dive into the strategies and tactics used by these industry heavyweights to captivate the world with their brands. From understanding the importance of PR in building a strong brand image to mastering the latest techniques, you'll gain valuable insights and inspiration that you can apply to your own PR efforts. Whether you're a business owner, marketer, or just someone interested in the world of PR, you won't want to miss "The PR Power Play: How Twitter and Elon Musk Took Over the World with Free Exposure." Links and Resources: DeAnna's LinkedIn Bob's LinkedIn Bear Ice Box Website If you are interested to read the book, Lean Customer Development: Building Products Your Customers Will Buy by Cindy Alvarez, it's available on Amazon https://amzn.to/40qfGzC I'm reading this amazing book named Lean Customer, and one of the common problems that we see over and over and over again is that most Nors  Start a business...  based on their idea, and they're not necessarily solving a problem that the public actually has. There's a completely different mindset that you want to employ when you're thinking about starting a company. There's a really valuable story in the book that I wanted to just outline for you really, really quickly, and that story is about a business that sells milkshakes. So right away when you're thinking about milkshake sales, you're probably thinking about textures and flavor. Maybe ingredients. And that's exactly what this company did. They asked their customers to describe their ideal milkshake. Those recipes and ideas were gathered, and they started making those exact recipes that their customers said they wanted. And guess what? Sales didn't budge at all. They then discovered that 40% of their milkshake sales happen first thing in the morning. Remember, you want to solve a problem with your business. So rather than asking customers to describe their ideal milkshake, they ask customers what job they hired the milkshake to do. That question is important because it shifts the customer's focus from the product itself to why they actually purchased the milkshake in the first. So after reframing that perspective, the customers would tell stories about having a boring hour-long commute, how they weren't yet hungry yet to order food, but they wanted something that could hold them over until noon. Most of them were in work clothes, so they didn't want to worry about making a mess, and they only had one hand to be able to use to eat whatever it was that they wanted to. So think about the difference between each of those goals. Originally, our goal was to sell more milkshakes, and there are only so many ways that you can do that. But when you approach the problem from a problem-solving perspective, just think of how many more opportunities you're able to reduce the pain of your customers who are hungry, bored, one-handed people. Who doesn't want to make a mess of their clothes, you can branch out into all kinds of other opportunities like smoothies or any food that can fit in a cup holder and be eaten with one hand.  On Invest in Sqft, we help business owners invest passively in multi-family real estate. My name is Matt Shields and my mission is to help all of you entrepreneurs out there grow and protect your business the way that the wealthy do. Today we're gonna be talking about PR and the impact that it can have on your business. Obviously, companies like Twitter and people like Elon Musk use PR to generate massive, massive global exposure and establish themselves as household names. If you're trying to build a powerful business, obviously PR plays an important role in building a strong brand image and capturing the world's a. Today we have the founders of a trailblazing PR firm from Chicago named Bayer Icebox. Together, Bob and Deanna's clients have been featured in some of the largest publications in the world, including the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Lifewire, and Crunchbase, just to name a. They've helped international brands grow and establish their US presence. They've catapulted startups to new heights and even reinvigorated a tired old nationwide company to become a thought leader in their industry. If I asked you what you thought would be better working with a smaller PR firm or a huge PR firm, what would be your answer? You're going to learn that and so much more on today's episode of Invest in Square Feet.  I feel like a lot of people may not necessarily. Know what the difference is between a PR firm and a marketing firm. Um, can, can you elaborate on what the differences are there?  Including sometimes clients, right?? Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I'm sure they're like listening. I don't wanna No, it, it's, it's okay. It, the way I describe it is like, marketing is sort of a broad category. Uh, PR is sort of, uh, is, uh, a function of marketing, although, I'm gonna contradict myself. PR can also sort of be the quarterback that drives everything too. So the way that I look at public relations is, and the way we look at it, is, uh, really anything that you're doing that's gonna be public-facing, whether it's the thing people think about, or news releases or articles in, in publications or video interviews. Uh, you know, podcast appearances. That's all public relations. But also a lot of what we do for our clients is a strategy around how they're gonna message important things both internally and externally. So, uh, that, that's something that, that the bigger an organization gets, the more, you know, important it is to have that message when you've got, you know, we've gotten applied, uh, clients that have an employee base of a thousand plus or several thousand employees. They need to do PR internally. Like they need to figure out how we're gonna communicate this change to our employees. Um, you. We're fortunate that our clients aren't doing this, but as we look ahead to 2023 of people thinking about potential hiring freezes or layoffs, how do you communicate that effectively? Because what you're saying internally can become external very quickly. We saw with that C E o, I think it was from better, where like he had like the zoom mass firing. I can't remember if it was better or not, but that became a viral story where like, wow, he really handled that poorly.  It's interesting and I'm actually glad that you brought that up. I'm, I'm curious what your perspective is, right? So obviously Elon just took over Twitter, and when he took over the same thing. You, you saw these mass, uh, layoffs and, and you know, quite frankly, you know, kind of crass way of laying people off, like, you know, here's a picture, you know, in your email, you're fired. Right? That's like how some people were reporting. And, um, you know, when you, when you think about it, right? You know, from a delivery stand. The wrong way to do it, right? Yeah. But from. Uh, from a pr, from a, from a, you know, making a wave and making a push out into the market, like that's the stuff that people are gonna be talking about. And, you know, again, Elon knows that everybody has a phone or has access to social and all of that, so the more that he can get people talking Yeah. The, you know, the more he's gonna be out there. And, and I, I, I guess I'm, I'm curious what your perspective is on that and, and, You know, is, is there a, I know there's a thing, obviously, we're going through the whole FTX thing. There's a certainly mm-hmm.  a, a negative, um, you know, bit of news or, or, uh, a negative way of doing things. But at the same time, you know, is there, like, again, that that sort of, there is nothing as negative publicity or something like that, right? Does that, does that make sense? Yeah, no, I think it's spot on. Outside looking at it, it is an interesting case study in like, you know, different types of communication. And, and the reality is we don't know the internal numbers, but from what Elon is saying, people are using it more than ever because it's out there. Like, Hmm, i, I, you know, people wanna see what he's gonna do next. , it's obviously impacting people's lives and you know, unfortunately, people are out of jobs. But you're right from a pr, like a, like a, a media perspective, he is getting a ton of press for Twitter way more than we, than we got, than, than they would've gotten, like, you know, over the last 12 to 18 months. So, um, as a PR pro, I err on the side of, you know, I think it, it, you know, we're representing clients, so I think. It's almost like a lawyer where it's like, we can be really aggressive or we can sort of be really, really, um, conservative in our approach to arguing this case. We have the tools and the toolkits, like, how aggressive do you want to get, you know? Mm-hmm. , and I think that's the key is like, I'll have that conversation with clients. If we wanna be edgier, we might get more pr. The trade-off is we might get some Article headlines that we don't love, but we're getting pr, you know? And, I think that that's a conversation, just a double edge sword. Yeah. We had that conversation earlier though, because, um, we can get aggressive. I mean, we, you know, we're, we're following those types of stories and trends, but. Um, it's really the client's comfort level that you've gotta be okay with. And I, again, I keep going back to like a lawyer where what's your comfort level? How aggressive do you wanna get when we argue this, you know?  I think the reality is like you. There's no PR professional that knows exactly how the public is going to respond to something. Mm-hmm.  and in an era of social media, everything's so heightened that you are kind of rolling the dice when you go public with the messaging. But again, the trade-off is nobody knows who you are. Right. So I always say like, either, you know, if you're not out there in the public space, then, then you're, yeah, we have, we have friends who are like, I'm not even on Twitter and me. Reading and, and, and I'm thinking about getting an account now just to be in the note. Right. Um, and so to, to see that there are people who, a, haven't been using it. And now this is the only reason why you're interested in it.  Gotta be some endgame in his head, you know? We don't really know it yet, but there's some sort of end   I feel like PR is a tool that has helped build amazing wealth for countless companies over the years, but at the same time, it's a tool that is relatively misunderstood, I feel, by a lot of company owners. What would you say is one of the biggest uh, I guess misconceptions? A lot of people may not necessarily understand about pr.  yeah, I think the wrong way of looking at PR is that you're gonna have a definitive. ROI on this article or this news release, this piece, or this mention. And unfortunately, there are people out there that are looking for that and I always kind of tell them like, if it's not possible, right? Like it's, you're creating a broader awareness, broader buzz. You know, the things that you know, I think you should be looking for in an agency is like, do they have experience in your industry? Um, do they have experience telling stories? About companies like yours. Um, even if they don't have industry experience, I think they have to have some sort of understanding of how to create a campaign for like, we do a lot of stuff in manufacturing and supply chain logistics. We've had clients in that space that helps us. But even if we don't have a client in direct space, I think it's like, you know, we try to tell prospects, like, you know, in our experience it is something that can be recreated. So, uh, we. We find that like, um, understanding a client's voice, working with them to identify that, and then figuring out the channel. So it might be news releases if we have something that's relevant. One thing I wouldn't say is like, uh, and I'm seeing brands do less of this, is like, don't put on a news release every month because you feel like you have to, like, if they're not news, don't, don't. Otherwise, it just feels like, you know, a boy who cried wolf and there's not really anything there. Um, I think one of the things that. Must be doing is, especially like we, we primarily work in b2b, but like having a LinkedIn voice, not just for the corporation, but for other thought leaders in, in the, in the, uh, brand. Um, doing contributed articles in publications is super valuable. Doing podcasts like this, I think is super important. You're creating content you can share on LinkedIn in emails that you can share in, you know, with prospects. The, the, the, what you wanna get out of an agency is the momentum to create the kind of content across different channels that you can, uh, package and, and amplify your voice. Mm-hmm. And it's the energy that agencies give. So we don't, you know, we, we have some clients worked with for six years. We have some clients, we do a, a year-long campaign, six months. But it's that energy that you get for a third party whose sole focus is getting you awareness, whatever channels make the most sense for you. Yeah.   I, I do believe that the creative side of what a PR agency can do. Mm-hmm.  for you is important too. I mean, you can hire someone to write a blog for mm-hmm. , your LinkedIn, your website, um, you know, but, but what are you really doing? With this information that can be, you know, beyond like, it, it has to be, you know, uh, what's the word I'm looking for? Like, not e evergreen. It, it, it has to be long lasting. Yeah. E ever e evergreen content. You're right, Dee. I mean, I think the, the, it's not necessarily we do tasks for our clients, but it's really more, um, The consulting part that I think clients find the most value in mm-hmm.  is like, what have we done? What's it worked over the years? Uh, what do we have, what kind of crazy ideas do we have? Um, you know, cuz when you're, our, most of our clients are marketing directors, chief marketing officers, communications directors. They're busy day-to-day with the minutiae of being internal at a company, or if they're CEOs or founders, they're even more busy, right? Yeah. Mm-hmm. So I think., you're not hiring somebody to take things off your plate. You're hiring an agency to, try to push you and be, be bolder and bigger. Yeah. Yeah.  What are some of the things that people, I guess, should be bringing to the table if they're, if they're looking for a PR firm? You know, is there, are there materials or things that you know, they can bring or, or that they should have, you know, when they're looking to hire a PR firm to be able to, you know, again, communicate their voice, their message, there, you know, whatever it might be. Um, like what are some of those assets, I guess, that they can bring to the table, to help you guys do your jobs better? Mm-hmm. , if that makes sense.  Well, we look at ps, it's a two-way street. Mm-hmm.  at the end of the. Um, and what I mean by that is there has to be some back-and-forth communication. So what clients can bring to the table, whether it's, you know, the C M O or communications director, is time to actually give us the information that we need. Mm-hmm. , we can run with it, but a lot of times reporters. They, want to hear a voice. They, they, they just, they, you know, email interviews, those are definitely happening. Um, but sometimes they, they, they want to hear it from straight, from your mouth. And so to be able to dedicate that sort of time where even if you just give us a recording where we can have your information, um, directly. You about your brand and what your vision is and what your goals are, and what you do, who you serve. All of those kinds of questions are really important. So, I think time is probably the most important thing. If you don't have the time to actually apply yourself or engage with your agency. Um, good luck. Yeah. Yeah. You're not gonna get that my time is important, even before that. Yeah. So making sure you've got dedicated. But then, the biggest thing is like giving us all the materials we need, which would include, like, we have a client that gave us access to their intranet right away. And so we can look through case studies and comb through sales materials and training and everything. Are we using all that stuff? No. Like, we're not sharing that with media, but we, we, we are doing a crash course and who they are, what they do. So from there then we can have interesting ideas because we already know the foundation of who they are and what they're trying to accomplish. Um, sometimes, especially with clients who've never worked with an agency, it's like they feel like if they tell us something, we're gonna like go to a journalist right away and share all their secrets, you know? Mm-hmm. ,  and I'm like, just the opposite. We wanna know all this stuff. Um, you know, we're your counsel, like tell us everything. And. We will, will use our discretion, and work with you to figure out what we wanna share. But yeah, the more we know the better. And so, that also includes time putting those things together. Mm-hmm.  and the clients that don't work out. And we've had this over the years where it's like, you know, can you guys just, um, Just draft something? Well, we can, but if we draft everything, it's gonna sound like a PR agency wrote it. You know, like we, we need to Yeah. Need to sound like a, there there's a human element, you know, the public relations part. Yeah. Of what we do. Um, I'll also throw in there that, that sometimes going through the information and, you know, you're digging, you're researching, you're gathering it all. You might even discover pain points. Mm-hmm.  that. Organizations didn't know they had mm-hmm. , you know, where your material actually isn't getting the message across because of what you're saying to me right here mm-hmm. is different than what you're putting on LinkedIn. Yeah. Interesting. And so going through that information, and, and again, the, the, the time to talk through these things, you can, you can actually learn a lot about what clients are missing out on. And you say that one word or you know, you evoke that one emotion, and all of a sudden people. What I found is cross departments, like bigger companies, well, we say it this way, we say it that way. There's like no synergy or, you know, um, an across messaging. And so to Deanna's point, that might not seem like a big deal, but if it's like playing a game of telephone, if it's too, you know mm-hmm. dispersed across and, not accurate like it's, you know If you have a challenge internally, or externally, your message is probably not getting conveyed in the right way either.  Yeah. Yeah. That's really interesting. I never really even considered, you know, how, how, how powerful that can be to just get everyone, you know, sort of aligned and in that, uh, and, and all speaking, you know, that, that same direction.  So looking at some of your past clients and past relationships that you've helped grow, does anything come to mind when we talk about challenges or things that people or companies were trying to overcome, whether that might have been a miscommunication or P problems, either internally or externally? I'm trying to hone in and get people to think of it. What types of problems have been solved using PR that maybe they might not have necessarily thought of before in the past?  I think one company comes to mind. Um, we worked with them, you know, we, we, we remained close to there, their former president, but it was a, um, it was a big franchise. There was an acquisition. They basically were bought out a year and a half ago. Um, had been a 35-year franchise business, you know, but when they came to us, uh, one of my first sort of full-time clients in 2017, and, um, really what she said is we had, we had done some pr. Over the years, but really the last 10 years have done kind of nothing. So I thought it was an interesting challenge because there was like, everything was kind of like stale, what was out there. They needed a refresh and they chose to work with me because like, you know, she's like, we're gonna get the attention from a small firm that we wouldn't get at a bigger firm. So we, for them, our challenge was to get, you know, immediate exposure for her as a thought. Um, and to also continue to generate buzz for these new franchises they were selling. Um, ultimately, you know, it not to say like, you know, p uh, uh, you know, this, it was because of our campaign solely, but like over a three year period, like with a lot of buzz and energy, um, you know, they got the attraction of from a, a large in investor and we're acquired, right?   And so that's the kinda example of like, you know, getting the word out. When, when you're a brand looking to be acquired, let's say, um, you know, obviously those companies are doing their due diligence, checking you, your financials, but there's also like an emotional element. Like if this brand is out there in the public sphere, I'm seeing articles about them. I'm seeing 'em in the New York Times, the Washington Post. We're hearing those. It's like that can help when you're packaging your brand to something that really has value beyond just, the p and l sheets. Yeah. So, yeah.  I would say, you know, over the last probably year and a half, we've seen quite a few of our clients, um, go through acquisitions, which is really interesting. Um, you know, for, for me, someone who's, and it's bittersweet cuz sometimes, well, and sometimes the, you know, it's, they get fired and they're like, oh, this out. But, you know, we, we still feel like, again, building up on these stories and. Building up, the, person. People trust people. Mm-hmm.  people buy from people. Mm-hmm... And so when, when you can be not just a thought leader, I mean, that's a lot of what we do, but it's almost like, I don't know, I, I think of like your insurance guy. Okay. We know him on a first-name basis. We, I can picture what he looks like. Um, because there's, there's a person you're not, Going with whoever is the top one. Like you, you connect with the person. And so yeah, I think what we do a lot of, a lot of calls and a lot of conversations with our clients, um, it pays off when the person comes through. Mm-hmm.  and all of this messaging mm-hmm. , um, we can, you know, Bob's a, a great writer. I sit next to him sometimes and I'm like, you just put that out in like two seconds. Like, how did, how'd you do it? Writing is one thing, but you can't develop a whole personality. Like you, you have to build that up over time. Mm-hmm. And so I think the value of what we do and what we've seen with many of our clients is that that personality comes out and that's where people are finding the strongest connection. Mm-hmm.  and, and that as you're defining it, you know, personality. It could also be, you know, a combination of everything, you know, for a company. So that company creates, you know, is, is creating that personality, if you will, that feeling, you know, you can kind of know or expect what you're going to feel and get when you interact with that company. Would, would you agree with that?  Yeah, I mean, the biggest compliment we get is like we've, uh, we've got a couple of clients where like our team member. They, they'll just be like, you know, they'll forward something over and like, uh, you know, our agency can write something, right? So they realize that we've understood their personality, their identity, and sometimes we have to be like, is this really in scope You know, but, um, but yeah, I think the point is like the, the, the company has a personality and a brand. The best one that I see out there, one of the better ones is like, on Twitter, going back to Twitter is like, um, this is like an iconic example, but like Wendy's Twitter brand is just great, right? It's a, it's a personality. It's funny, it's edgy.  and I think a lot of brands are trying to try to like recreate Wendy's on Twitter. Just you can't really, you know, yeah. Can't do that. You gotta have your own personality. But I think that you're spot on. Um, you know, brands have. Identities too. And personalities, man. Yeah,  At what stage should someone start thinking about reaching out to a PR firm again, like, you know, when's too early? When, you know, when, obviously, you know, you, you said that someone hadn't really, Done any PR in the last 10 years. , but, but when is, when is the right time, I guess, to be able to reach out? Like, and again, you even mentioned like, don't feel like you have to put out news, you know, every day. Like there any examples of like, these types of things that you should be going through that you should be experiencing or trying to communicate? Um, and, you know, those would be the right types of things to do a press release or, you know, hire a PR firm to be able to communicate those types of. Yeah, the first thing that comes to mind is probably cuz we're working with a handful of brands in the space, but like when you've got private equity money and you're looking to grow quickly and maybe you're looking to acquire brands, it's great to have a PR agency because you're, you know, you're gonna have some news that's just like hard-hitting news that's, that's coming up. Um, that's a great example. Mm-hmm. , I think also, you know, sort of on the flip side, if you're like a startup, Looking for more VC money, or maybe you're in sort of series B and you're looking to expand another great reason to, to get PR awareness. Um, but really I'd say in terms of the stage like you gotta have a product to market, I think. Yeah. The times when it doesn't work is, and over the years we've taken clients like this and we kind of realized, you know, trial and error, right? It's like If you don't have a product ready for the marketplace, but there's only so much we can share with media, right? Mm-hmm. , there's like not a story there. Mm-hmm. , you know, you can only say it's coming only so many times. Yeah. So, and I think as media wants to see what kind of customer base you have, what kind of revenue you have, what kind of, you know, how many employees do you have? So I think like, I think there's a bit of excitement with, you know, brains that are just starting mm-hmm. and they think PR is gonna really get us there. And, you know, the, the missing link in that situation is a reporter's gonna say, Hey, can I test the product? Yeah. Mm-hmm. , can I see your website? Um, and if it's not ready, they're moving on to the next story. Yeah. Um, and then there's, or giving a bad review. Right. Bad review.  Um, but that's probably another reason why you might want a PR agency. Um, you know, if, if there is something negative out there, um, yeah. You know, whether you made a mistake in saying something or, you know, there's the situation last year of the, the C E O who apparently made her staff work at the factory, um, during the hurricane. Oh yeah. And you know, that was a situation. , I immediately was like, there's gotta be more to this story. You know, I don't, I can't believe, a person would say, Nope, you have to come to work during these dangerous conditions. Um, and, the more I read, I was like, oh, that facility was actually safer than some of their homes. So there's a way where that story just got, The wrong message about that got out, I think, in my  opinion, when perhaps there wasn't a PR council kind of helping. Well, I think bridging that along. So there, there are situations where, yeah, you might want someone to come in and help actually explain what happened. You know, tell, tell your story about a situation. I don't wanna say cleanup messes because, you know, if you made a mess, you sometimes do have to own it. Mm-hmm... Um, but yeah, startup brands, that's, that's a little bit more difficult, I would say. If you're starting a brand and you're really excited, um, there are definitely some things you need before pr. Now, one thing I would say is if you're an established company, starting a new division, or a new product launched, then it makes sense to have somebody on, you've already got revenue. Looking to expand the industry. We also have clients bring us on if we're looking to expand in a particular vertical. So one of our clients is really making a push in warehouse automation. Um, and, you know, we, we have experience in that field, so like, They're engaging with us to really sort of expand in 2023 beyond what they've been doing. So, yeah, I, I, I think that, hopefully, that answers your question, Matt. Yeah, no,  That makes perfect sense. Yeah. And, and, and Deanna you kind of touched on this too, I guess the, uh, the, the intended outcome of. Of PR is to essentially get other people interested in whatever you are doing, you know, other reporters or other bloggers or what, whatever it might be, uh, so that they start, you know, reaching out and, and asking you for more, so they kind of just spiders out. Is that, is that basically correct  One, of the reasons that people would want PRS to get the exposure.  and exposure in, in most cases can lead to web traffic, sales, um, you know, acquisition. Mm-hmm... Um, in, in some cases the c e O really wants to be the expert. Mm-hmm.  at this thing. Mm-hmm. , um, sales and everything will, will follow, but I want to be the, the person you think of when you think of automation or, you know, whatever their industry is. Mm-hmm. , so that's, that's also something. That folks look for. Yeah. There's a bit of a, yeah. Maybe a healthy ego sometimes PR, right? Um, yeah. But I, I think, I think you're spot on D Yeah.   All right, so we learned exactly how important it is to decide if you want to work with a small PR firm or a very large PR firm. Your experiences are going to be completely different depending on the size of the company. If you're interested in reaching out to Bob or Deanna, they can be reached@bearicebox.com. So that's B E A R icebox.com and both of them are available on LinkedIn as well. And that's Bob or DeAnna Spoerl, S P O E R L. We also have one. Amazing piece of information from Bob and DeAnna, and you can only get that in our newsletter. So make sure to head over to Invest in SqFt (Invest in Square Feet)  and subscribe to that newsletter so you don't miss a step there. And of course, subscribe to Invest in SqFt (Invest in Square Feet) on whatever podcast platform it is that you use.  

Cindy Alvarez works in higher education, is a Doctoral Candidate at Kansas State University for Community College Leadership and is a mom of a seven-year-old boy. In 2021, she founded Career Confident Mujer which is designed to empower and coach first-gen women to advance within their careers and learn how to voice their purpose and worth. Cindy offers a confidence coaching program and writes blogs to help first Gen professionals gain career confidence to articulate their value and level up in their careers. Links of your social media platforms https://www.instagram.com/careerconfi... https://www.facebook.com/careerconfid... https://www.tiktok.com/@careerconfide... / @careerconfidentm... https://www.etsy.com/shop/CareerConfi... Chicana & Latina Moms Channel shares live podcast interviews with chingonas/oes who share their knowledge and passion with the community. Unidos crecemos y nos ayudamos a crear una vida mejor. You can listen to this podcast on all podcast platforms: Apple Podcast Anchor Spotify. YouTube: https://youtu.be/Fb23X_a-toY

In this episode of the podcast, Dr. Sciarretta interviews three committed middle school educators (Veronica LaRoche, Cindy Alvarez, Moray Black) who have identified a need in their school and addressing it through a system of mentoring that's based in relationships and positive examples of how to make changes in student's lives.Show Notes:The following organizations were mentioned during this episode:1. Albert Einstein Academies (AEA) - http://aeacs.org/2. King Chavez - https://kingchavez.org/Mr. Mo's article in San Diego Magazine:https://bit.ly/3FykB8A

In this episode, Laura talks to Cindy Alvarez, Director of UX for Powerpoint, about how to figure out what sort of hire you really need and write a job description targeted to the right folks.  Drink pairing: Sparkling Rose

In episode 10, we talk to confidence coach Cindy Alvarez about the power of using your voice at work.  Cindy is a Career Confidence Coach helping first-gen professionals level up their career journey. Empowering women to lead authentically and use their voice to create opportunities for growth.  You can follow Cindy on Instagram  Or visit her website to find more resources and to learn how to connect with her.  

 Pre-order Michele's book! https://deployempathy.com/order Follow Nicole on Twitter: https://twitter.com/NicoleBaldinu Michele Hansen  00:00Welcome back to Software Social. This episode is sponsored by Recut. If you make videos or screencasts, Recut could help you cut your editing time by half or more. Recut removes the awkward pauses, the gaps and the silent parts so you can stop spending hours slicing and dicing with the razor tool. Recut makes a cut list that you can import into your favorite Mac-based editor, like Adobe Premiere, DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut, or ScreenFlow. You can get 10% off with the code SoftwareSocial, or download the free trial at GetRecut.com.  Michele Hansen  Hey, welcome back to Software Social. I am so excited about what we have going on today. We have Nicole Baldinu, Co-Founder and COO of WebinarNinja joining us. Welcome, Nicole.  Nicole Baldinu  00:51Hey, Michele. Thank you. I'm excited to be here.  Michele Hansen  00:54I'm so excited to have you on. First of all, I mean, you guys have built such an incredible company. Just to give a little bit of background. So, WebinarNinja was founded in 2014. You also produce the $100 MBA Show, which won Best of iTunes in 2014. 23 full-time team members, 100% customer-funded, an amazing business. I am so excited that you're joining us today. Nicole Baldinu  01:24Aw, thank you. That's, that's really nice. It's almost like sometimes you forget, you know, where you've been. You just keep going and charging forward. It's like, yeah, we've been around since 2014. Must be doing something right. Some days, it doesn't feel like you're doing anything right, you know. Michele Hansen  01:43When in 2014 did you guys launch? Because we were also 2014. Nicole Baldinu  01:47Oh, WebinarNinja, like, around April.  Michele Hansen  01:51Okay. Nicole Baldinu  01:52It was around April, yeah.  Michele Hansen  01:53Wow.  Nicole Baldinu  01:54I know. It's crazy. Michele Hansen  01:56It's kinda, so, we launched in January of 2014, and we are still just the two of us. And you guys have like, 23 people, and I mean, it's so interesting how many, like, different paths you can take. Nicole Baldinu  02:14Yeah, and the number of iterations, I think, like, yeah, I don't even remember version one, you know. It feels so long ago. But that's true. Like, I don't think we in, like, even intentionally set out to just grow, grow, grow. You just kind of take one, one step forward, and you just keep moving. It's like, yeah, we need help, like, you know. You're answering all your customer support queries in the beginning, and then it's like, no, you need some help. And then you hire your first teammate, and then it just, just keeps growing. Michele Hansen  02:47So, let's fast forward a little bit to, I guess, would be five years into it for both of us. We met at MicroCon in 2019 and were basically instant friends. Um, and I remember what, I think, I think you might have come up to me, and you were really interested in learning how to do customer interviews, which is, like, my jam. Nicole Baldinu  03:17Yeah, I loved that conference so much. It was, it was such a, I think for me, that was the first time, it was kind of the first SaaS-focused conference. I think a lot of the conferences I'd been to before were very, I don't know about you, if you've attended like, other conferences outside the SaaS space, but a lot of podcasting conferences, you know, I remember the first, do you remember NMX? New Media Expo? Michele Hansen  03:45The name sounds familiar, but I didn't, I've never been a huge conference attender, so I haven't been to a lot. Nicole Baldinu  03:52That was my first conference, and that was January of 2013. And that was literally when I, you know, that was my first kind of foray into entrepreneurship, and so meeting bloggers and podcasters, and it was all just such a new unknown, like world. But I remember like, MicroCon being just really special because I just felt like, that it was, it was kind of like, I felt people were really honest and vulnerable and authentic when it came to talking about, you know, the pitfalls and the challenges of SaaS. businesses. And yeah, and I remember I loved your talk because I just felt like, you did, what was it like a chat, like it was a 10 minute tactic or something, or?  Michele Hansen  04:41Yeah, it was an attendee talk.  Nicole Baldinu  04:43Yeah. Michele Hansen  04:44Yeah.  Nicole Baldinu  04:45And, and I still have your notes. I shared this with you last time we spoke. I still have your notes because I just thought it was so helpful, so practical, and the, the crazy thing is though, when was that? So that was MicroCon 2019, right?  Michele Hansen  04:59Yeah. Nicole Baldinu  05:00That's the first time I heard, I think that's the kind of the first time I really thought, oh, you can do, like, you can talk to your customers. You can do, like, this kind of user research. And I've only done my very first customer user research this year, three years on, but I still have your notes. And it was, yeah, it was just super inspiring. I just thought it just seems like such a cool thing to do. And, yeah, so I finally, finally took the plunge. Michele Hansen  05:28So, let's dive into that plunge a little bit because I think it's, I think it's totally normal that it would take you some time from from like having that moment of being oh wait, I can talk to customers, to then sort of, not just like, sort of working up the courage for it, but also the time and, like, fitting it into your schedule and thinking it really, really through and so, like, could you kind of take us back to earlier, I guess, earlier this year, when you really started to hit the ground on it? Nicole Baldinu  06:03Yeah, and I mean, I should, I should also say that we had done user research and customer interviews, but it wasn't me that had done it. So Omar, who's my Co-Founder, the CEO, also my husband, business and partner in life and business, he had done the first user interviews, and kind of, because he's more customer has been always more customer-facing. He had done user interviews, but it was something that I never felt that I could do. Like, I'd kind of be behind the scenes and reading Intercom, like support, you know, conversations and seeing what, you know, customers were saying and replying. But it was all very much chat and email never like, let's get on a call and let's talk about it. So recently, we've kind of wanted to, the whole reason behind starting to do this is because we wanted to kind of refine part of our offering and also look at a potential MVP out of this, this offering. And so I just thought, I don't know, and all of a sudden, I just felt like I want to do it. I don't even know what, like, why I just woke up one morning and said I'm going to do these, which is, like, really unlike me. But um, but I just decided to, yeah, I think I made that decision, like, I'll do the interviews. And then as soon as I took that decision, I literally went for my notebook from the, to look for the notes that I took from MicroCon. I then went and looked at all your blog posts and everything that you had on, you know, on the topic, as much as I could like, digest in like, I had a week, I think, before I was like, I scheduled the first one. And, and then yeah, and then I was just like, okay, I have got my questions now, thanks to like, you know, I looked up some of the sources that you had, you know, referenced. So I went in, you know, okay, I've got my questions. Now I know what I want to do, I want to know what I want to ask. And then it was literally the mechanics of okay, get a Calendly up, send out the blast, like, the blast out on Intercom to actually invite people to, you know, to be interviewed. So then all those little pieces, too, that I think, like, I was kind of procrastinating on, they just all fell together really quickly. It's like, okay, you just got to invite people, people reply. You just got to have a, you know, a sequence to, you know, send them your Calendly then it all gets done, then you've got your questions. And then it just, then they just started. And then as soon as I did my first one, I was really upfront with the first. She was she was lovely, my first interviewee. And that was great, because I was very nervous and I just basically said, you're the first person I'm interviewing. And so that kind of just made me feel a bit more at ease. And, and she was just lovely, and just easy to talk to and just answered all my questions. And then I just realized, after that call I was like, this is so much fun. I love this. I think when we talked last time, I was like, totally geeking out on just how much fun it is and what a positive experience it actually ends up being talking to your customers. Michele Hansen  09:08I think last time we talked, which was about a month ago, I remember you said that it had basically become your favorite part of your job. Nicole Baldinu  09:19Did I say that? Yeah, it's true. It's weird. It's totally taken me by surprise. I was thinking a little bit more about that, though. Why? I feel like it's a very positive experience. Because initially, I thought oh, you know, there's the potential that you know, the conversation could just turn into like, this is one of the things I thought it would turn into. I thought it would turn into a let's, let's ask about, you know, support for WebinarNinja, like, show me how to do this or complain about something that's not working as expected. I thought it would go down that path, but it didn't. It just ended up being very much focused on the questions I was asking and, which was really focused on what they do, like how they deliver their content, and, and about their business, and about why, I mean, the, my favorite question, and this, I think comes from your blog post, and I think this is what kind of, I see them light up and kind of lights me up is when I asked them, what's the big picture? What are they trying to do? And that question is just, it's, it's just my favorite question on the interviews, because it just brings out, yeah, it just gives them an opportunity to really share, oh, this is why I'm doing what I'm doing. And they get to just, I don't know if I'm like rambling a little bit, but I don't know, would, have, you've asked that question before, right? Michele Hansen  10:55Yeah, I'm curious, can you ask me that question as if you were interviewing me? Nicole Baldinu  11:02Okay. So, Michele, what's the big picture of what you're trying to do? Michele Hansen  11:13And that's it.  Nicole Baldinu  11:14That's it.  Michele Hansen  11:15Like, that's only a couple of words. They're not very big words. Like, it's a such a simple question, yet you have found that that just lights people up. Nicole Baldinu  11:28There's only one person that kind of asked for clarification, and then when I had to reframe it, I just said, why are you doing what you're doing? Oh, my why? Oh, okay. But everyone, everyone else kind of, it was interesting, like, everyone else got it. And it all comes around to you know, they want to help, they want to share, they want to empower. It's just, it just brings out, yeah, it brings out their why, but without asking it in that way. Because I think if you say what's your why, I think if it's all, I don't know why that feels a bit more daunting than what's the big picture? Because the big picture, because sometimes I would actually expect from that answer that they would talk about what they're trying to achieve in their business. I actually didn't know originally where that question would go. That's kind of probably what surprised me. I thought it would be more focused on the business. Like they would tell me what they're trying to achieve maybe financially, or, you know, what their goals are. But it did kind of step back, for some reason it did actually generate the response of this is why I'm doing what I'm doing. That makes sense?  Michele Hansen  12:38No, it does. I've actually been, I was thinking about this a lot the past couple of days, because one of my, my subject matter editors for my book was, they made a note in the, in their edits, that I had a couple of why questions, and they reminded me that those need to be what questions, and I've been thinking about what's and why's all weekend, actually, so I'm so glad you brought this up. Because when we ask someone a why question, we're asking, in some ways we're asking for causality. We're asking why they do something, like, and asking them to sort of think through the reasons why they do something. But if you ask someone the same question, but you rephrase it as a what, it's a much easier question. Like, why are you here versus, what led you here? They're basically the same question, but if I asked you what led you here, you walk me through the different steps that you went through, and the causality can sort of come through the details of that. Versus if I said, why are you here, then you have to sit and be like, why, why am I here? And like, like, you get lost a little bit in the question. And so asking a what question instead is usually cognitively much easier to answer. And, you know, maybe, as you said, some people may, you know, they may appreciate being asked a why question after the initial what question. But for most people asking, you know, I mean, I do this with my daughter, too, right? Like, you know, instead, instead of saying, like, you know, you know, what, like, why aren't you down here for dinner yet? Like, being like, be like, so what's your plan? Like, dinner is on the table, what's your plan? And then that opens up to, oh, well, I'm actually getting this ready. Or like, you know, this weekend, she's like, oh, I'm making a card for daddy for Father's Day. Okay. Alright, cool. Like, you're not, this isn't an intentional thing. But so, rephrasing as a what I think gives it also, as you said, it gives people options to where to take that question. And I think, I think kind of as sort of both of us just had a moment of earlier on when we were talking of like, wow, I guess we have been doing this for a long time, and it's pretty awesome, and how cool is that? Like, we don't really step back and think about that very often, and I wonder if when you asked that question it like, it sounds like you are prompting that same kind of reflection in people, which, in turn, makes them really excited to talk to you because you're making them feel good about themselves and what they do. Nicole Baldinu  15:25Yeah, I'm just blown away by that, just that little explanation about the difference between the what and the why, like, it just takes the whole process, the whole, asking those questions to another very sophisticated level, and just realize sometimes, like, I don't want to, I don't, sometimes I feel like I don't want to think too much about it, but I think it can be so sophisticated and so refined, the actual process of asking these questions and learning more about people. I guess this is my first run at it, and, yeah, like, even if it's, if it's not at that level, whatever I'm getting out of it, I feel is worthwhile. And I know that I can take it to another level because I love what you just explained, and I think it makes so much sense. But yeah, there's, there's so many layers to it. There's so many layers to it. And it's true, I do feel that it does, I do feel that sense of like, it's fun, like they don't mind, like the crazy thing is it's like, I don't know how long the tick, a typical interview should be, I should ask you that, but, you know, I said, you know, I don't want to take up too much of people's time. So I just said, okay, I'll just keep it to 20 minutes. They've all gone overtime. And there's not a sense of like, I need to get off this call. I have to initiate that let's get off this call, because they're very happy to continue talking because we're both actually having, I feel like it's an enjoyable experience on both sides, which is really cool.  Michele Hansen  16:56Yeah. Nicole Baldinu  16:57That really surprised me but, Michele Hansen  16:59So that that makes a lot of sense to me, because you are, like, you're hearing about how your product helps them and, which, you know, you mentioned you, you know, pop in on intercom support tickets and whatnot. Like, I think for, you know, us founders who do, like, talk to our customers a lot just by default, because you know, there's customer support their sales, like there's, there's all those other things. But interviewing someone is so, so different, because they tend to, like,, it's much more appreciative environment than, than like, hey, there's this bug or whatever. But then also for that person, like they get to talk about what they do, and they're actually, like, MRI studies they've done of people when they are, when they are talking about themselves or their experiences to another person, like, the parts of the brain related to motivation and enjoyment light up way more than they do, than if you were, than you were listening to someone else talk or you're talking about something that isn't directly related to your own experience. So it's, like, it is enjoyable for people to, to be asked these questions. I think as you kind of, as we were sort of talking about a little bit with the what's and the why questions like, there's, there's a lot of, like, levels here, but you don't necessarily need to know all of those levels in order to get started. You just need to be, I think, kind of like you did, to just sort of being willing to take the jump, which, you know, I think the first time feels a little bit like a polar bear dip and jumping in a freezing cold ocean, and you're like, okay, here we go. And then the next time you're just like, sprinting towards the ocean and excited for it. Nicole Baldinu  18:48Have you ever been, this is just going sideways now, have you ever been stood up on one of these interviews? Michele Hansen  18:53Yeah.  Nicole Baldinu  18:54Okay. Lots, or just? Michele Hansen  18:56So I noticed that that, like, it used to happen a lot when I was a product manager working in a company. Um, and I think that so, but when I'm from recruiting as the founder, like, people tend to show up. Like, it seems like it's more important to them. Like, when I was working in a company, we had someone who was coordinating all of the interviews, and so we had never spoken to them before we got on the phone with them, even over email. And I think it's easier to blow off, like, an anonymous person, rather than the person they're going to talk to, nevermind somebody who has a title, whether that's Co-Founder, or like, I mean, sometimes we actually invented titles just for the purpose of interviews, like,  Nicole Baldinu  19:42That makes sense, though.  Michele Hansen  19:43Like, I think we had some, like, Head of Customer Experience, which wasn't even a title at the company. And actually, Cindy Alvarez in Lean Customer Development talks about doing this, too, that like, it's much easier to know show when, when you don't feel, like, an attachment to that person. Um, so I think these days, if someone doesn't show up, it's usually because like, something, like, something legitimately like came up. Nicole Baldinu  20:12Yeah, no, I totally feel that because it's literally been just one person. And I do feel like there would be something that, you know, because I do recognize that sometimes I feel like there's an element of not intimidation, but like, oh, wow, I'm actually getting to talk to the Co-Founder, so it is a bit more special for them. And I do feel the first part of the interview might be a little bit stiff, but, yeah, maybe a little bit stiff until we kind of, you know, until I think a big picture question really breaks down the, let's forget that, you know, we're just literally two people talking. And then I think they do forget the interview setting. But yeah, I'd say like, you know, just one out of how many I've done, and it's not that many. I've done 13, so one out of 13. That's not bad. You can do the math. I haven't got a calculator, what ratio percentage that is. But, uh, yeah. Yeah, I definitely think, and the flip side of that, too, is the, the recognition at the end, which I get to feel really kind of special or feel so, it's so rewarding for me when they'll turn around at the end and say, you know, this is so good that you're doing this. Like, they really appreciate that a company would actually listen, take the time to talk to their customers. And they, you know, I've had people wish me the greatest success, and you're gonna do a great job, and this is gonna be amazing. And it's just, and you can, and I feel, I like, I genuinely feel like they're being authentic, because they felt like I've listened to them. I've, you know, taken the time to, you know, give them an opportunity to share what they need, what their pain points are, you know, learn a little bit more about themselves. And then I do feel there's that reciprocation of, like, I wish you well, and no, I wish you well. It's kind of cheesy, but it's kind of sweet at the same time. Michele Hansen  22:17You know, I find that people who I do interviews with, even though it's really not intentional, like, they will offer to do a testimonial for us. They will offer to be a reference like, like, or I'll notice on Twitter, like six months later, like, they're the one who's like popping in on threads when, when people need what we do. Like, it really creates this, like, incredibly valuable connection. Nicole Baldinu  22:42Yeah. Do you have any, like, do you do any follow up? Like, what's the next step? Because literally, I'm at like, stage one right now, where it's like, doing the interviews. And I've just hardly just, you know, started the analysis, and I haven't gotten very far. And then I'm thinking, well, what's the next step after that? Is there some other sort of, invite them to a focus group with, you know, and like, what's, what have you done? Michele Hansen  23:08So I actually, I want, I'm going to come back to asking you about the analysis because I'm super interested to hear about that. Um, it depends really on what it is. So for example, if they like talked about something that, let's say that we ended up deciding in the future might be a new product, for example. Like, I might come back to them and be like, hey, you know, this thing we talked about, and it might have been, like, three years ago, like, we're exploring this now, like, can I talk to you specifically about this particular element again? Or maybe we have a prototype of something, asking them to run through it with us or, you know, if there was sort of something that was unclear, or we needed to follow up with them about. Um, but sometimes there is no follow up. Very often, actually, they will follow up with me and be like, hey, like, you know, like, you guys seem really open to feedback, and so we're, you know, we're working with this other piece of data, like, is there any chance you guys could support that or whatever? Like, they will come back to us very often. But there doesn't, you know, beyond a thank you note, really, there, there doesn't have to be, there can be as much follow up as you need, right? Like if you're doing something early, like it might make sense to, you know, to ask them hey, like, can I come back to you for further questions if our prototype or maybe to help us prioritize different things, like, to go back and do card sorting with them? It really kind of, like, it sounds like you're talking to people who have been customers for a long time. Do we actually talk about that targeting you did to decide who to talk to? Nicole Baldinu  24:40I didn't, I just ran, no, they might not be customers for a long time. But they definitely are users and have an, I would say that the ones who've replied are all you know, they've had, they've used the product for some time, but it could be as little as like a month. It doesn't, Michele Hansen  24:59Yeah.  Nicole Baldinu  25:00Not longer than that. And then yeah. Yeah, we've had, I've had some more longtime users, but generally it's, yeah, just people that, because the question was quite targeted and asked a very specific question when I did the call out, like, do you do this and this? I'd love to talk to you. Michele Hansen  25:19Oh, yeah. What was, what was the exact question? Nicole Baldinu  25:22The exact question was do you run live courses or live training?  Michele Hansen  25:27Oh.  Nicole Baldinu  25:28I want to talk to you. And then so, that was the, yeah, that's how I got them in. So I think that specific question helped as well. I want to know if it helped. Michele Hansen  25:45You picked that question because you said you're exploring an MVP of something, and also sort of potentially repositioning or sort of tweaking your positioning towards that specific market? Nicole Baldinu  26:00Yes, because its current usage, it's a current way that the customers are using, you know, WebinarNinja to deliver live training and live courses. So I wanted, I want to learn more about how they're using it, and where their pain points are, and, yeah, and what we could do better in that, in that kind of space. Michele Hansen  26:23It sounds like it was a question most people would answer yes to. Nicole Baldinu  26:27If they do it, yeah.  Michele Hansen  26:28Right. Yeah.  Nicole Baldinu  26:29But not all our users. So because I suppose you know, there's a lot of WebinarNinja users who are, you know, using webinar ninja for marketing. Michele Hansen  26:39Right.  Nicole Baldinu  26:40And they're not necessarily delivering training.  Michele Hansen  26:43Right. Yeah. So the analysis, before we talk about what you do after the analysis. Nicole Baldinu  26:51Oh, my God.  Michele Hansen  26:53Like, what are you doing? Like, like, what does this process look like for you right now, and it may not be sort of conceptualized as a process. Nicole Baldinu  27:04Okay. So so far, it involves printing out the transcript. Step one. Step two is reading it with a highlighter. And, and so I guess where I'm struggling, or where I kind of want to refine the analysis is, what am I looking, because I'm looking for a few things, I suppose. I'm looking for, you know, words that they say or things that they actually do, actions they perform, things that are concrete. Then there's also the oh, I wish something that they don't do, but it's kind of aspirational. So. you know, how much weight can you put on, on, on on those kinds of, you know, it's like, oh, we should do this. But it's like, what, have you ever done that? You know, would, how likely are you, they don't know. They wouldn't know, right? If it's something just like, you know. And then it's also, yeah, looking at it through the filter of like a marketing message. How would I then communicate to resonate with people who are doing the same thing so that I could, you know, attract the same type of people as customers? So there's kind of like, three buckets, I suppose. And so yeah, and then so there's the highlighting. And then it's, because of there's these, kind of, three kind of areas, and I'm just kind of have columns, and I'm just writing out, you know, things that fit under those columns. Michele Hansen  28:45Do you feel like you're getting out of that what you were hoping for? Nicole Baldinu  28:52Um, well, I have to say so far from just the interviews themselves, I feel like I've gotten a lot out of it. But I want to see, I, I'm not sure. Yeah, I don't know. This is a little bit like, I don't know, early stages. Michele Hansen  29:08Have you, have you tried diagramming the process for them, like, trying to sort of identify what, you know, what their big picture is, and then just all of the different pieces of that? Even if they're not, you know, sometimes we think of a process as like a bunch of linear steps, but sometimes it's also sort of an ecosystem of steps that kind of sometimes all sort of happen in a jumbly sort of order at the same time. And I'm curious if you've been able to sort of figure out what that looks like, for even, for each person. Nicole Baldinu  29:43No, but you're obviously saying that I would do that diagrammatic kind of visual for each one, right? And then later, look at all the similarities.  Michele Hansen  29:55Yeah. So some, I mean, if you're looking at people who are going through the same Sort of overall goal, then it would make sense to, to split out all of the different steps per person. And then to break them out by, did we talk about the different dimensions of problems? Like, the functional, social, emotional dimensions? Nicole Baldinu  30:16You, yes. But I was very, like, new to everything you were saying, so I was like, one process to everything. Michele Hansen  30:24That's okay. So, um, so I find this helpful, especially for, like, pulling out relevant parts that can be used for marketing or like, you know, sort of, wouldn't, like, quote them exactly, but like, the can inform like copy and whatnot. So there's a functional dimension to a problem, which is, you know, they, they want to run a sales training because they need their salespeople to sell more, or something. Like, so they need a tool that allows them to connect with their sales people remotely, for example. There's a social element, which is they are running this training, and there may be 10 people that they are training, and those 10 people have different levels of technology experience, and some of them have been with the company for a very long time, some of them are very new. Like, what are the different social factors going on, and how might they express that? Like, I want my team to feel like they're on the same page, like, for example, might come through and a quote, and then you say, so you hear that word team? And you're like, okay, well, what do they mean by team? Who exactly is on that team? Like, what, what is the story of all of how all these people came to be working together? And there might be an emotional perspective, as well, of like, how, how do they feel about the tool they used before? Was it frustrating for them? Did they feel like they were, you know, banging their head against the keyboard trying to get it to work, or to get their team members to install it? Or did they feel great when they get off of these trainings? Like, does this, do they find the tool, you know, easy to use? Like, and like, those are like, those also can come out in the quotes, too. And so what I find helpful is to kind of diagram the different steps, and they may be they may be linear steps, they may be, you know, concurrent, like, and then, and then, but for each one of those pieces of it, breaking out the functional, social, emotional components of it.  Nicole Baldinu  32:23Okay. Okay, yeah. Wow. This is so cool because there's just, there's so much to unpack in, you know, in one person's experience. And then I suppose, as you see the commonalities, I guess, that's when you, you know, across more people saying, if they're saying the same thing, I guess that's when you get validation, that's when you get, yeah, the understanding that this is affecting, this could be affecting more people. So I suppose I've gone, you know, the experience of actually talking to one person becomes very, like, it's just you and that person, and it becomes very much restricted to that world. And then you've got to step back and go, okay, I've got all these people now, they've said all these things. Now I've got to make sense of it. So it's just, I feel like I'm still, I'm enjoying the first stage so much. Like, and I feel like I've gotten a lot out of that first stage. But now it's like, okay, now this data is so valuable. What do I do with it? And I want to make sure that, yeah, it's unpacked. And then obviously, I know this information, I'm going to be unpacking it, but then I've got to communicate it to the rest of the team, as well, so putting it in a way that's like, you know, I can share it with Omar and the product team and now CTO. So there's just so many levels to it, but it's you know, it's all doable. It's exciting. Michele Hansen  33:59I think the more people you talk to, too, you're gonna start seeing those commonalities in in processes. So like, last episode, I was talking a little bit about activity-based design, which is basically the idea of going a step beyond human-centered design and thinking about the different processes that people are going through, and then you can start seeing the, the commonalities there. So for example, when I'm talking to someone, and it turns out that they're using us because they're doing, you know, US government Home Mortgage Lending compliance, like, their experiences of that are going to be very different than somebody who is you know, working with getting the timezone back from tractors that are in fields. And, but if I talk to somebody who's doing the compliance, like, generally like, like, as I when I hear that I'm like, okay, now I have a better idea of what this process is, from an overall perspective. How can I learn more about this person's, like, their company's specific functional elements, their specific social elements, like, their specific emotional pieces? Like, what do they think of the other options that they've tried compared to the other people I've heard and getting more and more depth each time. But there can be a huge breadth and, especially as I think you guys also are a horizontal SaaS, right? So you're, you're selling across many different industries, and, and I think this is where customer interviews are so fun, because I get to learn about so many industries and like, I'm like, I didn't even know that was a thing.  Nicole Baldinu  35:45I know, so varied.  Michele Hansen  35:48Versus, you know, someone who's selling horizontally, sorry, vertically within one industry, like they might not have that sent, you know, it might vary based on, you know, company size, or stage or whatnot. Um, I'm really curious, you mentioned bringing your team into it, which, you know, as a two-person team, we don't really do as much, but so like, how have you been able to bring other team members into this, or like, involve them in what you're learning?  Nicole Baldinu  36:16Well, so far, like, the first step I thought would be just okay, I'll put it, I'll make sure that I share the recording, the transcript, the details of the person I've used, you know, in like little folders on Basecamp. I've just basically organize it into little folders. And then as soon as I, you know, put up a new, a new interview, then I make sure that I share it with, so far right now, it's just me, oh my and our product, UX-UI designer, Maria, so I just share it, I say, hey, guys, there's a new interview. And I know they've been watching some of them. You know, I've highlighted a few that I thought, oh, this is super interesting. This person is definitely someone we'd go back to. So that's been just the extent of it so far. I feel like if I'm going to then, you know, share it, say, with our CTO, when it comes to more development time or, you know, when it starts to be a thing that's going to be fleshed out, or you know, if there's any development work, then I feel like there would have to be more, kind of, maybe a bit more of a traditional kind of a report where it's like, you know, X percent of people said this, or the majority are saying this, this is what, you know what I mean, it would have to kind of be backed up a little bit more by statistics. Michele Hansen  37:29I think they're, you know, I like to use qualitative and quantitative data together. And, you know, I, thinking back to when I was working in a bigger company, you know, we would say, like, for example, we see, you know, you know, 35% of users drop off on this page, and, you know, and then having a sort of data that like, this is important to the business for, you know, x millions of dollars reason, right? Like, if fewer people did that, then hello, money. And, but then we have like, quotes from people like, oh, well, it turns out that, like, they find this really difficult because that x, or they're looking for this other piece of information that isn't there, so they click the back button. And then here's a quote from someone that says, I really didn't know where to go, like, and then, and it's like, okay, so like, here's the picture, like, and now here, okay, great. Like, here's a project, like, here's something that a team can work on of, like, you know, the bounce rate from here is 35%. Like, let's get it lower because we have the, you know, we understand why people are doing that. We also understand why it's important to the business. Like, statistics, I find will not really come out of interviews, but interviews, explain why the statistics are what they are. Like, a spreadsheet of data will tell us what is happening, but it will never tell you why. Only people can tell you why, but you need both. Like it's, it's, I think there's sometimes people sort of think about, like, that you only use, you know, quantitative data, or, you know, I talk about interviewing and I think you only do interviewing, and it's like, no, like, porque no los does, like do it all together. Nicole Baldinu  39:10Porque no. Definitely los dos. Definitely. Well, yeah. It makes sense. And I think that's just, I think, why the process of actually, you know, literally doing a very manual printing out, highlighting actually gives you the opportunity to, to read because, you know, you're going to get one kind of experience when you're listening the first time and, you know, you're asking the follow up questions. But there's so much probably that's missed, even in on that call, until you actually go and read and, and highlight and just, yeah, analyze word for word, everything that was said. And there's a whole other layer there to unpack. Michele Hansen  39:15Yeah, I wouldn't, have you asked Maria, your UI-UX designer, to also read through them and do her own highlights?  Nicole Baldinu  39:42No, not yet. But that, is that something you, Michele Hansen  40:00That might be interesting. And, and there is research that says that when, like, multiple people are analyzing an interview, they pull out more of the problems. So the, the sort of like the paper on customer research was in the, is in the context of usability testing was called The Voice of the Customer. It's from 1993, or 1994, and they did all these different tests on how to pull out customer problems and analyze them. And they found that multiple people analyzing an interview tends to bring out many more of the user needs than just one person doing it.  That makes so much sense. Yeah. Because then, like, the way I'm thinking, obviously, I'm trying to do this as fast as possible, too, right? Let's get to like, analysis and presentation of like, here it is. This is what we need to do. I am trying to, like, speed that process up. But yeah, the risk there is that it's really then just my interpretation.  Nicole Baldinu  41:02Right. Michele Hansen  41:03Right. And some, they might just watch a video and, yeah, I remember that. But that deep level of analysis is, yeah, is going to be missed if we don't give that opportunity. So, yeah, that's a really good point. I mean, we did that, I believe, like, with the first user interviews. We gave those to our marketing teammate. So, that's how those were used, I feel. But I definitely think if it's, you know, we're starting, you know, if it's an MVP, then yeah, you're right, like someone else needs to go, I think this is actually the problem, or yeah, I agree, or no, I disagree. That's not the problem. And I think, you know, organizationally, giving somebody else the chance to discover something, too, like, they're not just being told what the learning is, but they have it, like, chance to discover it for themselves and maybe see something that somebody else missed. And one thing I love in Erica Hall's Just Enough Research is she talks about how powerful it is to bring other team members into the process because they're, you know, when we do interviews, and then bring them to other people and we're so excited about what we've learned, sometimes people can feel threatened or intimidated by that. Because all of a sudden, there's this new information coming in, and now it's on them to learn it rather than they didn't get to experience the joy of discovery themselves. And, Nicole Baldinu  42:29Oh, my God, you're blowing my mind. Sorry.  Michele Hansen  42:30And so it's more, like, if you can allow them to be in on the discovery process, whether that's as, you know, a silent listener on the call, or as part of analyzing the transcripts, or even, you know, collating transcripts, which is when you find, you know, let's say you find five common quotes, and then you're putting them all together have different commonalities. like they're part of the process, they're part of what's being learned, and they feel more invested and aligned with like, like, I just remember when, what like, when we, when I worked in a bigger company and we started bringing in the developers into just sitting in on usability testing, and not even asking questions or anything, just just listening, like, the level of team motivation and alignment, like skyrocketed because all of a sudden, everybody was learning. Nicole Baldinu  43:23So was, I just, yeah, I hear you. Like that, it makes so much sense, but I suppose it's one of those things that we just feel like, oh, we don't have time, you know, we got to move on. We got to keep, it's one of those things that does take time. But you're right, like, that excitement that I think is, like, this is so awesome. I'm having so much fun. This is so important. I'm learning so much. Just by sharing it, it literally is just my experience at that, at that point, unless somebody else gets to discover it for themselves now. Oh, man. How long, this whole process is gonna take three times as long. No, no, but it's good. It's good. It's so it's so valuable. But yeah. Michele Hansen  44:06And also the, in, the process doesn't have to ever stop. You know, it sounds like you're sort of in an intense phase right now, where you've been, I mean, when did you start doing the interviews?  Nicole Baldinu  44:20Oh, my gosh. Would have been like, not that long. Probably just like, three, four weeks ago.  Michele Hansen  44:29Okay. And you've done 13 in the past month, basically.  Nicole Baldinu  44:33Yeah, less.  Michele Hansen  44:34Yeah.  Nicole Baldinu  44:34Is that a lot? Michele Hansen  44:35That's, that's a lot. Like, that's a really good number, like, um, you know, I guess you are doing a specific like, project. So I mean, usually the, what I, like, the general guidance is to do five and then sort of stop and pause and analyze and see if you need to change your targeting. So, it sounds like you're consistently hearing different things from different people, so that warrants talking to more people. But also making research not just something that happens when you have a specific question, but just as a general sort of, I think, I tend to call it, like, maintenance research, like just sort of, on a general basis. But like, that's, that's really good, 13 in that amount of time. And so it makes sense that it would feel a little bit like, okay, now I have to analyze all of this, and this is going to be a lot of time and like, where am I going to find the time for this, in addition to everything else, but I think, I hope that eventually, you can find a place where you're just kind of doing like one or two a week, and maybe you're doing one and your UX person or a marketing person or somebody, a developer even, like, they're doing another interviews, and then you've got just like two a week, and then it's like, okay, like, what did we learn? Like, you know, does this does this match what we've heard in the past? How does it differ? Like, what new have we learned? Like, is there anything else we should kind of, you know, consider digging, digging on in the future? Nicole Baldinu  45:59Hmm. I love that. I wish, I mean, frankly, like, the five would have been helpful if you'd told me that last time. Five? No, I'm just kidding. Michele Hansen  46:12I mean, you also don't, you don't have to limit yourself to five, right? Like, it's just sort of, that's like, the kind of goal. And again, that's, that is also based on research, too, that you can surface in the context of usability studies, but like, surface 80% of customer needs with five interviews, but that assumes a pretty defined scope. And where you started with a broad scope, it makes sense that you would need more until you feel like you're starting to hear patterns. Nicole Baldinu  46:41Yeah. And I love what you said, like, that it definitely, and I'm so passionate, I think the more I do this, and the more, like, I talk about this, and geek out on this, and just love this whole process, the more I realize how much it should be a part of just regular in processes within a company, like,  Michele Hansen  46:57Amen. Nicole Baldinu  46:58Like you said. Yeah, I know, right? Like, I'm gonna spearhead the user research of the company. Well because it is, I mean, I don't know, like, like you said, we said at the beginning, it's like, it's one of those things, I think, as a company grows, you end up doing a lot more management, and, and that's great, because if you're working with great people, it's okay to you know, to do all those management duties. But this just becomes, you know, and then, you know, there's obviously always the putting out little fires here and there, whatever. But this, this has just been such a positive experience that I think, just really enjoyed it for that reason. So having this as an ongoing thing, I think is, would be great. Michele Hansen  47:44It sounds like you are I, I can just, I feel like I can see how inspired you are by doing, like, by how motivating it is. I am, I'm so excited to continue hearing about how all this goes. Um, and I feel like, I feel like I could talk to you about this all day because, like, talking to people about talking to people is my favorite topic. Like, like for my book, I interviewed 30 people because I just, it's just so much fun. But if other people want to stay in touch with you, what, what is the best way for them to do that? Nicole Baldinu  48:26Oh, like, to reach out? Just reach out, Nicole@WebinarNinja.com. There you go. You got my email. Michele Hansen  48:34And you're on Twitter, too, right?  Nicole Baldinu  48:36On Twitter. I'm on Instagram as well. You know, they can contact our support team and ask them to call me. Yeah, I'm in there. I'm in there every day. Michele Hansen  48:49Awesome. Nicole Baldinu  48:51Yeah.Thank you so much. This has been so much fun. Like, like, like you said, I could talk about this for days, days on end. Michele Hansen  48:59Alright, well, that's gonna wrap us up for this week. If you liked this week's episode, please leave us a review or tweet at Nicole and I. We would absolutely love to hear what has made you think about. 

Who is Cindy Alvarez? Cindy is the author of Lean Customer Development and the Director of Customer Research for Github where she works to understand what helps developers collaborate to build effective solutions and drive change within their organizations. She came to GitHub and Microsoft from Yammer where she was Director of User Experience. Cindy's passionate about diversity and inclusion; supporting women, black, Latino, and girls in tech. We're so glad to share her talk with us!

After studying psychology in the late '90s, Cindy started her product, research, and design career. She has lead many Product, Design, and Research Teams over the last decades. Next to that she wrote and published the book Lean Customer Development. Cindy speaks in this episode, about how to best do customer research. She shares very practical examples of how to understand customer problems without interviews, and best practices to understand what customers really want and need. One of her key messages is that asking questions is not only important for customers, it also helps inside companies to better understand each other. Table of content: 0:30 - Intro Cindy Alvarez 3:20 - Day to day business as Customer Researcher 5:05 - Doing research on Twitter, Reddit, and co. 10:25 - Building stakeholder relationships to push research 13:25 - How to get started with research in your company 16:15 - Reducing and avoiding bias 19:15 - Talking and negotiating with customers 21:50 - Understanding customer problems 24:20 - Customer research vs. user research 27:40 - Handling design critiques with founders and managers 31:15 - Stock questions to understand the “why” 36:15 - Documenting research outcomes (TL;DR) 39:25 - The biggest mistakes leaders do about research 42:25 - Debrief Christan & Alex Cindy on the internet: Linkedin: @cindyalvarez Website: https://www.cindyalvarez.com Cindy's book: Lean Customer Development ✩ Follow The Product Bakery Podcast ✩

An interview with Cindy Alvarez. Cindy is Director of Customer Research at GitHub, the world's leading software development platform. Cindy has long experience in customer research with GitHub, Yammer, Microsoft and Kissmetrics. She also wrote the leading book on customer research, 2014's Lean Customer Development which aims to guide teams to build products their customers need. We speak about a lot, including: What it's like doing customer research with the world's largest community of software engineers The importance of testing your customer interview questions and working out what does and doesn't work The importance of empathy, keeping down-to-earth and being someone customers feel comfortable talking to Whether a Bachelor's in Psychology helps her to play mind games with her subjects (mwahahaha) Why she wrote the book, how she did it, and whether she's going to write another one How to answer some of the common objections to customer interviews, and how ensure you can build a culture of speaking with customers directly How to optimise for Continuous Discovery and ensure you get a flow of customer feedback and learning And much more!

Lean customer development is a topic that people may think relevant only to early stage startups, but in our opinion the imperative of customer development - building products your customers will actually buy - never stops, whether this is at the startup, grow up or scale up stage. Cindy Alvarez discusses this with Stephen Millard and Paul Papadimitriou.Highlights:- Think of customer development as building your buying audience as you are building your product.- Find the problems your customers are impassioned about solving.- Use silence to draw out the answers you really need to hear.Cindy Alvarez is one of the world’s leading thinkers and practitioners on this topic. She is the Director of Customer Research at GitHub and was previously a Principal Group Product Manager at Microsoft, where she embedded customer development practices across the organisation. She is also the bestselling author of Lean Customer: Building Products Your Customers Will Buy.

Viral marketing is the holy grail for most entrepreneurs and marketers. Most people think of a meme or a video that gets millions of views, but that’s not the right way to think about viral marketing. The hidden truth about viral marketing is it has to deliver core value in order to spread amongst the masses. According to Travis Steffen, viral marketing is the act of leveraging your own audience to pass your message on to others.    Travis is a serial entrepreneur, growth lead, and author of the book Viral Hero. He has helped create hundreds of millions of dollars in value for various Silicon Valley startups.    The reason most messages do not achieve this viral success is that most entrepreneurs and marketers start with an idea without verifying the details and purpose with intended users. When strategic flaws emerge, entrepreneurs are forced to pivot their business. A better approach is to engineer products in a way that turns customers into enthusiastic hosts that spread your message to anyone they come in touch with - just like a virus. And this virality can’t be circumvented with handwashing, masks, bleach, or experimental drugs.    In this episode, Travis shared key insights on building a business from ideation to launch and beyond, the right way to conduct market research with customers, lessons learned from a failed business venture, and the right way to build viral products and messages.     Partner: 1 Question Marketing Survey for New Event   Key Insights   Transitioning from professional online poker player and MMA fighter to building businesses Launching a business using his current skill set and no business education The process of building a business from ideation to launching to thriving  Having a structured conversation with potential customers with money to understand their challenges and enable the creation of solutions and sales copy   Most pivots happen because business owners are not listening [to customers] early enough    Targeting potential customers with money  How to develop a business and bring it to market it in a way that hits and sticks   Those who help create the plan, don’t fight the plan   Lessons learned from a failed business venture (very powerful story!)  How Travis grew his business, GrowFlow Building a product or business that grow themselves    You want to make virality feel like you're adding core product value to the user's life by exposing others to it.    How to market your core value to potential customers    Partner: Download our Sample Deal Package   Bullseye Tips:   Travis Steffen’s Book Viral Hero: How To Build Viral Products, Turn Customers Into Marketers, And Achieve Superhuman Growth   Lean Customer Development by Cindy Alvarez   Digital Resource: Google  Slack   Most Recommended Book: The 48 Laws of Power (Robert Greene) Lean Customer Development (Cindy Alvarez)    Daily Habit: Getting up at 5 am and starting his daily routine of 20 things.    Wish I Knew When I Was Starting Out: It doesn’t matter if I think I’m smart or important, what matters is how the customer feels about what I built.   Best Place to Grab a Bite in Marina Del Rey, CA Cauliflower Pizza    Contact Travis: LinkedIn Instagram: @travissteffen

Cindy and I talked extensively about customer interviews. Interestingly enough, while we should always listen to customer requests--we should note that sometimes customers don't always tell us what they want because they don't know if it's feasible. But we would know. Dig deep for answers, and listen to their problems. They might respond with a "safe" answer, but don't settle for that.

S01E17 - Why & How to do Customer Development Interviews?Guest: Cindy Alvarez, Author of 'Lean Customer Development'#StartupBasics series in Insights Alley Podcast: Startup, Product, Growth, Sales & Strategy Insights for Entrepreneurs.It's a Blog/Podcast by Arun Verma. Get Notes of this conversation at https://insightsalley.comPlease give feedback and suggest topics for next episodes on arun@insightsalley.com

In diesem Podcast geht es um Fragetechniken, die Dir helfen, um das echte Kundenprobleme zu verstehen. Warum ist das so wichtig? Einer der Hauptgründe, weshalb Startups scheitern ist die Tatsache, dass das angebotene Produkt kein Problem löst. Um das zu vermeiden sollte man noch lange bevor man ein funktionierendes Produkt anbieten kann mit den potentiellen Kunden sprechen. Im Interview erklärt Daniel von Spreadmix alles was ihr braucht, um erfolgreiche Kundeninterviews durchzuführen. Euch reicht unser Talk zu dem Thema nicht? Dann checkt doch folgende Bücher zum Thema aus: "The Sprint" von Jake Knapp - https://amzn.to/2WTIjYj "The Mom-Test" von Rob Fitzpatrick - https://amzn.to/2EWL0yo "Change by Design" von Tim Brown - https://amzn.to/2KCuDL2 "Lean Analytics" von Alistair Croll & Benjamin Yoskovitz - https://amzn.to/2K8gs0v "Lean Customer Development" von Cindy Alvarez - https://amzn.to/2WUJneM "Disciplined Entrepreneurship" von Bill Aulet - https://amzn.to/2I4aWtV --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/techrap/message

Mike Cottmeyer on Leading Agile, Daniel Goleman on Coaching For Leaders, Christina Wodtke on Build by Drift, Joe Vallone on Agile Amped, and Cindy Alvarez on Product Love. I'd love for you to email me with any comments about the show or any suggestions for podcasts I might want to feature. Email podcast@thekguy.com. This episode covers the five podcast episodes I found most interesting and wanted to share links to during the two week period starting February 4, 2019. These podcast episodes may have been released much earlier, but this was the week when I started sharing links to them to my social network followers. MIKE COTTMEYER ON LEADING AGILE The Leading Agile podcast featured Mike Cottmeyer with host Dave Prior. To kickoff 2019, Dave and Mike got together to talk about the year ahead. What I liked most about this conversation is how it got into a discussion of how to introduce Agile to an organization that is just beginning to move away from traditional waterfall methods. Mike talked about how meal prep services got his wife interested in cooking for the first time and contrasted this with the way Agile is often introduced to enterprises: exclusively showing the end state and leaving out details about what Agile looks like when you’re just starting. Just as the meal prep services show more respect for people beginning to take up cooking, Mike says that the Agile community needs to show more respect for people beginning their Agile journey. iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/kicking-off-2019-w-mike-cottmeyer/id995790407?i=1000427423678&mt=2 Website link: https://www.leadingagile.com/podcast/kicking-off-2019-with-mike-cottmeyer/ DANIEL GOLEMAN ON COACHING FOR LEADERS The Coaching For Leaders podcast featured Daniel Goleman with host Dave Stachowiak. As a fan of Daniel’s work on Emotional Intelligence, I was eager to hear this interview. Daniel talked about three different kinds of empathy: cognitive empathy, emotional empathy, and empathic concern and compared and contrasted them. I loved what Daniel had to say about distinguishing between a healthy and an unhealthy showing of vulnerability, especially since I read so much advice telling leaders they need to be vulnerable. iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/391-getting-better-at-empathy-with-daniel-goleman/id458827716?i=1000428075330&mt=2 Website link: https://coachingforleaders.com/podcast/391/ CHRISTINA WODTKE ON BUILD BY DRIFT The Build by Drift podcast featured Christina Wodtke with host Maggie Crowley. Christina’s book, Radical Focus, has been showing up on the recommended lists of most of the people I follow, with some saying that it was the first book they read that really showed how to apply Objectives and Key Results or OKRs, so I was quick to hit play on this new-to-me podcast. What I heard was a great conversation on high-performing teams, avoiding traps in setting OKRs, and most importantly, the fact that OKRs are supposed to be stretch goals. iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/build-15-christina-wodtke-on-radical-focus-living-your/id1445050691?i=1000426996091&mt=2 Website link: https://www.drift.com/blog/christina-wodtke-okrs/ JOE VALLONE ON AGILE AMPED The Agile Amped podcast featured Joe Vallone with host Adam Mattis. While there was a lot of talk about the Scaled Agile Framework in this conversation and I’m still working out how I feel about that, there was also a great conversation about lean startup ideas, particularly innovation accounting and Joe provided concrete examples from the SR21 Blackbird to self-driving cars to make his point. iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/innovation-accounting/id992128516?i=1000427846817&mt=2 Website link: https://solutionsiq.podbean.com/e/innovation-accounting/ CINDY ALVAREZ ON PRODUCT LOVE The Product Love podcast featured Cindy Alvarez with host Eric Boduch. Cindy Alvarez is the author of a book in Eric Ries’ Lean series: Lean Customer Development. I loved how Cindy took the old saw about Henry Ford and the faster horse and talked about how maybe Ford should have rephrased the question to get the customers to talk about problems instead of solutions. I also loved her emphasis on good listening techniques and how this can mean having to tolerate an uncomfortable amount of silence. iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/cindy-alvarez-joins-product-love-to-talk-about-customer/id1343610309?i=1000428744289&mt=2 Website link: https://productcraft.com/podcast/product-love-podcast-cindy-alvarez-product-manager-at-microsoft-and-author-of-lean-customer-development/ FEEDBACK Ask questions, make comments, and let your voice be heard by emailing podcast@thekguy.com. Twitter: https://twitter.com/thekguy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/keithmmcdonald/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thekguypage Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the_k_guy/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCysPayr8nXwJJ8-hqnzMFjw Website:

Cindy and I talked extensively about customer interviews. Interestingly enough, while we should always listen to customer requests--we should note that sometimes customers don't always tell us what they want because they don't know if it's feasible. But we would know. Dig deep for answers, and listen to their problems. They might respond with a "safe" answer, but don't settle for that.

Everett Harper from CARE's board talks about the role of the leader in learning from failure, taking action to correct problems, and creating psychological safety. Some tools he refers to in creating safe spaces to learn from failure are: The Pre-Mortem: figuring out failures in advance, then building in mitigating actions before starting the project Retros: short for retrospectives, a repeated process for projects, teams, initiatives or companies, to open up a blameless, psychologically safe environment for team members to learn, improve and mitigate future risks. For leaders, it is an opportunity to access information and knowledge from people closest to the customer / beneficiary. Customer Development: articles from Steve Blank, Book by Cindy Alvarez , interview by Cindy (I love her work), 10 Things I've Learned about CD, and a basic "What is CD"

How do you make the culture change from traditional to Lean work? It requires changing behaviors and building new habits and competencies. In this breakout session, Cindy Alvarez will share strategies that Microsoft's Cloud & Enterprise division has employed to help its 8,000+ employees learn new skills, build new habits, and change behaviors. You'll learn the pros and cons of various approaches, what initial investments they required, and which situations they've worked best in. If your leadership is looking to you to recommend a Lean strategy, this session will help you make a recommendation that works best for your organization.

In every product team there are dozens of assumptions masquerading as knowledge. Cindy Alvarez talks about why challenging these assumptions is not only a good idea, but is necessary to the work we do as "product people." Cindy Alvarez is the Director of User Experience for Yammer (a Microsoft company), and the author of Lean Customer Development: Build Products Your Customers Will Buy. Cindy is a frequent speaker on UX, Lean, and tech culture.

In this episode that I speak with Rich Mironov, Roman PIchler, Steven Haines, Chad McAllister and Cindy Alvarez about the biggest mistakes product managers make. What will you learn – Biggest Mistakes!! You will learn about the biggest mistakes Product Managers make from these 5 successful product management experts. Orchestrate executive management Executive level roadmap clarity Disconnection between […]The post DYT 076 : Biggest Mistakes Product Managers Make appeared first on .

Cindy Alvarez is the author of Lean Customer Development. How do you develop products that people will actually use and buy? She shows Scott how to validate product and company ideas through customer development research—before we waste months and millions on a product or service that no one needs or wants.

In this Ferris Wheel episode, I speak with Cindy Alvarez who runs the research team at Yammer, a Microsoft company. She talks about Slack, understanding users and suggests an alternative to coming up with ideas – ask customers. Who is Cindy Alvarez? Cindy Alvarez runs the research team for Yammer (a Microsoft company), and helps […]The post DYT 060 : Don't Ask Customers What They Want | Cindy Alvarez appeared first on .

Cindy Alvarez is an expert in customer research and iterative development. She’s the author of Lean Customer Development, a hands-on guide for validating product and feature ideas. She's worked for small and medium-sized startups - and now runs user experience for Yammer (a Microsoft company). Cindy’s got a flair for explaining user-centered design in a compelling and understandable way. From her early days doing tech support for her professors at Harvard — to her current leadership role evangelizing lean tactics at Microsoft — Cindy thrives on new challenges. Listen in and learn how a seasoned UX expert blends customer development with product leadership.

Cindy Alvarez knows how to go toe to toe with leaders who resist user research and still get it done. The author of Lean Customer Development shares tips from her experience for conducting research–even when you don't have formal authority or budget. Buy Cindy’s book: http://www.leancustomerdevelopment.com/ Follow Cindy on Twitter: https://twitter.com/cindyalvarez Follow Rosenfeld Media: https://twitter.com/rosenfeldmedia

02:44 - How To Create New Forms of Value for Clients 08:02 - How do you create more conversations with clients? 14:33 - Different Forms of Packaging Books by Alan Weiss creditcardjs.com    19:58 - Giving More Value as a Full-time Employee (FTE) 30:00 - Productization Minimal Viable Funnel (MVF) Naming Kurt Elster Micronar.com Heartbleed Nick Disabato (Nick D.) 38:58 - Communication Groupthink 01:01:33 - Website Welcome Mats SumoMe Thrive Leads Picks LeadPages (Philip) Blue Ocean Strategy, Expanded Edition: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant by W. Chan Kim (Philip) Lean Customer Development: Building Products Your Customers Will Buy by Cindy Alvarez (Philip) Catan Universe (Reuven) Jonathan Stark: How To Increase Your Income Without Hiring Junior Developers (Jonathan) Jonathan Stark: How To Price Your Services Without Leaving Money On The Table (Jonathan) Coaching Call with Jonathan Stark (Jonathan) SumoMe (Chuck) The DevChat.tv Blog (Chuck) The Freelancers’ Show Mailing List (Chuck)

02:44 - How To Create New Forms of Value for Clients 08:02 - How do you create more conversations with clients? 14:33 - Different Forms of Packaging Books by Alan Weiss creditcardjs.com    19:58 - Giving More Value as a Full-time Employee (FTE) 30:00 - Productization Minimal Viable Funnel (MVF) Naming Kurt Elster Micronar.com Heartbleed Nick Disabato (Nick D.) 38:58 - Communication Groupthink 01:01:33 - Website Welcome Mats SumoMe Thrive Leads Picks LeadPages (Philip) Blue Ocean Strategy, Expanded Edition: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant by W. Chan Kim (Philip) Lean Customer Development: Building Products Your Customers Will Buy by Cindy Alvarez (Philip) Catan Universe (Reuven) Jonathan Stark: How To Increase Your Income Without Hiring Junior Developers (Jonathan) Jonathan Stark: How To Price Your Services Without Leaving Money On The Table (Jonathan) Coaching Call with Jonathan Stark (Jonathan) SumoMe (Chuck) The DevChat.tv Blog (Chuck) The Freelancers’ Show Mailing List (Chuck)

Go check out Freelance Remote Conf!   Freelancers’ Show GitHub Repository: github.com/devchattv/freelancerstopics   02:48 - Luca’s question 05:40 - The Right Things To Do in the Right Order: Work on your mindset Interview potential clients (Identify the expensive problem) Lean Customer Development: Building Products Your Customers Will Buy by Cindy Alvarez Build a lead magnet and build social proof Build a landing page for your lead magnet Build a month’s worth of articles; set up an email list Start teaching. Go on forums and point to your lead magnet. 08:34 - Timeframe 13:17 - Do you need a blog? 14:21 - Social Media Presence (Earn Traffic and Attention)     16:47 - Starting a Business While Still Working at Another Job 22:53 - Impostor Syndrome Social Learning Theory 34:46 - Citing No Past Experience SoHelpful Beta Clients 37:48 - Webinars and Micronars 45:09 - Your Mailing List Picks Jessica Jones (Reuven) SoHelpful (Philip) Brennan Dunn: How To Start a Freelancing Business That Won't Fail (Philip) The Tim Ferriss Experiment: Derek Sivers Reloaded – On Success Habits and Billionaires with Perfect Abs (Jonathan) 8 Tips For Software Developers Starting Their Own Business (Jonathan) Veronica Mars (Jonathan) CES (Chuck) Las Vegas (Chuck)

Go check out Freelance Remote Conf!   Freelancers’ Show GitHub Repository: github.com/devchattv/freelancerstopics   02:48 - Luca’s question 05:40 - The Right Things To Do in the Right Order: Work on your mindset Interview potential clients (Identify the expensive problem) Lean Customer Development: Building Products Your Customers Will Buy by Cindy Alvarez Build a lead magnet and build social proof Build a landing page for your lead magnet Build a month’s worth of articles; set up an email list Start teaching. Go on forums and point to your lead magnet. 08:34 - Timeframe 13:17 - Do you need a blog? 14:21 - Social Media Presence (Earn Traffic and Attention)     16:47 - Starting a Business While Still Working at Another Job 22:53 - Impostor Syndrome Social Learning Theory 34:46 - Citing No Past Experience SoHelpful Beta Clients 37:48 - Webinars and Micronars 45:09 - Your Mailing List Picks Jessica Jones (Reuven) SoHelpful (Philip) Brennan Dunn: How To Start a Freelancing Business That Won't Fail (Philip) The Tim Ferriss Experiment: Derek Sivers Reloaded – On Success Habits and Billionaires with Perfect Abs (Jonathan) 8 Tips For Software Developers Starting Their Own Business (Jonathan) Veronica Mars (Jonathan) CES (Chuck) Las Vegas (Chuck)

When Microsoft acquired Yammer last year, one of employees it gained was Cindy, an expert in applied Lean Startup techniques. Cindy will be joined Microsoft principal program manager Ethan Gur-esh to talk about how they’re transitioning teams into a Lean Startup mindset and away from the three-year planning waterfall cycles of the past.

Our guest today is Cindy Alvarez, Director of User Experience at Yammer and part of Microsofts User Experience Leadership team. Cindy is passionately curious about how people think and work. She is the author of the excellent book Lean Customer Development: Building Products Your Customers Will Buy. This episode focuses on her leadership journey and areas she believes we need to monitor. Interview by Liselotte Engstam. Production by Joel North.

When you have an untested concept, it’s easy to come up with reasons to avoid customer development or ignore the qualitative feedback you’re getting. Cindy Alvarez, author of Lean Customer Development and head of product design and user research for Yammer (a Microsoft company), leads several entrepreneurs through a live problem-solving session, highlighting actionable approaches to customer development challenges.

Moe and Cindy Alvarez discuss how to develop products that people will actually use and buy.

Cindy Alvarez, ace product manager and fellow blogger, tells us why it's hard for tech companies to build a products that are easy to use. We also discuss product manager's responsibilities for identifying new markets. Plus, a review of a fascinating book about a highly successful tech company, and the requirements survey is underway! Copyright (c) 2009 Tom Grant.