An engineer’s guide to talking with potential customers
Don't just jump into the solution, be sure to discover the how and why behind the problem
When I wrapped up my first call with a new user, I stepped out of the conference room with a grin on my face. Feeling proud, I almost skipped back to my desk. But unexpectedly, I was stopped by a remark from the CEO.
“Well, that seemed like a disaster,” Vijaye said, from his desk. “Huh? It went well, they are going to try out our iOS SDK,” I replied.
From an outside observer, who couldn't hear everything but could sense just enough of how the meeting went, it was a disaster. And as I later reflected on the conversation, I realized it hadn’t gone well.
As an engineer, my default approach is to jump into the solution – review the product, highlight the features, and talk about our robust infrastructure. I assume the user knows what’s important and I’m simply here to point them in the right direction.
While any customer conversation is an opportunity to showcase your product, it’s also an opportunity to learn. And in the early days of a startup, learning is one of the most important things you can do.
First call retrospective
In hindsight, I made a number of mistakes on that call. For starters, I let the user drive the conversation – responding with what was on the top of my head, rather than diving into the why or the how behind their questions.
In fact, other than lightly probing them on their tech stack, and perhaps asking a single question about the problem, I didn't get a great picture of how Statsig fit into their overall system and the types of issues they needed help with. I also left not even knowing how they found out about us. Given it was so early in our history, I still regret not knowing how they found out about us. We’re significantly better at tracking these things now, but it didn’t really cross my mind to just ask that simple question.
Since that first call, I’ve taken countless meetings with new customers and remained involved in customer support and feedback through our Slack channel. Throughout these interactions, I learned how to avoid the same mistakes I made in that first call. Here are a few quick reminders on how to make the most out of those calls, emails, and Slack messages.
Tips and tricks for customer conversations
1. Conversations are a two-way street
Nearly every customer conversation (putting aside specific support requests), should not be one-sided. You aren’t there just for someone to ask you questions - you should be the one guiding the discussion, and the best way to do this is to ask questions.
2. You can walk away with more valuable insights by asking questions vs demoing your product
During the early days of your startup, it's easy to be distracted by the excitement of talking with a prospective customer. But to make the most out of the conversation, you should think beforehand about what you want to learn.
What problems are they trying to solve?
What is their timeline?
What other solutions are they considering?
Are there any key features that are dealbreakers for them?
The learning extends beyond just product discovery. You may not care right now, but you’ll eventually want to know how they find out about you. This may give you insights into where your target audience is and how you can market to them.
3. Always have a concrete follow-up
A good rule of thumb: don't end without a next step. Be sure to capture any follow-ups that are brought up during the conversation. If there are none, then have a natural touchpoint to check back in.
After that first call, I was lucky that the customer was motivated enough to install the iOS SDK and actually start using it. But I could have done more to ensure the likelihood of that, like following up with documentation. Even if I had not been that proactive, following up with an email once we noticed traffic coming from that customer to make sure they weren’t running into any problems.
4. Show your actual product
Just last week, I had the opportunity to be on the other side of this conversation, talking to a founder at another company about our needs, their product, and potential integrations. Walking out of that conversation, I realized I had no idea what the product was actually capable of. I was shown a mix of notion docs and Figma files - never the actual product itself.
Demonstrating what you can do today is far more important than your grand vision. Now, if I ask about something that is only in the design phase, by all means, show me what it will look like. Just don’t be wishy-washy about what you have now.
5. Bonus points: Combine 3 & 4 to delight and surprise your users
When possible, delivering an actual change to someone from something you talked about earlier that week (or better yet, earlier that day) can make someone a fan quicker than anything else.
The #buildinpublic movement is growing every day, and for a good reason. Involving your users and their feedback in what you choose to prioritize now, not later, is a delightful experience. Rather than showing a timeline, or mocks in Figma, whenever possible, deliver it now.
This motto of shipping fast has served Statsig well over the past few years, and we continue to respond in real time to customer feedback and suggestions. It made our product better, our engineering processes sharper, and our customers happier.
There are a number of other potential learnings I could share, or suggestions of things to improve your customer calls - these 5 have served me well so far. If you have any other tips, feel free to drop them in the comments below!
Tore, you keep giving the most timely and impactful advice. Keep it coming!