Click Welcomes Dino Larouche

Click is delighted to welcome our newest member, Dino Larouche, founder of KnowledgeWare21.   KnowledgeWare21 was created to provide the educational world with a pedagogically sound software solution that brings together all school related data to maximize student achievement, teacher effectiveness, and resource allocation.

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Hey readers! If you know someone who is looking for an office and wants to work alongside other amazing people, maybe somewhere awesome like downtown Northampton, please share :). Thanks!

www.clickworkspace.org 

 

Congrats to Landry Communications, 2nd International Client!

Chris Landry.jpg

Congratulations to Clickster Chris Landry of Landry Communications.  He is recently back from a week in Holland with his client Solidaridad, an NGO that works around the world to create a more inclusive and sustainable economy. 

"Solidaridad actually invented fair trade," says Chris. "They launched the first fair trade coffee, and then the first fair trade fruit. But they're looking way beyond certification to find new ways to create supply chains that increase producer incomes, meet business needs, and reduce environmental impact."

Solidaridad is well known in most parts of the world, but has set up shop in North America for the first time. Landry Communications has been asked to develop and implement North American communications strategy for the organization — work that encompasses all three services the firm provides: brand identity, communications strategy, and content development.

"This is a multi-year project with a great client, committed to excellence," Chris reports. "Our week in Holland was with their communications staff from around the world. We spent much of it talking about both the art and science of telling a story. It begins with clarifying your goal, identifying your audience, crafting the message, and then (and only then) expressing the message in the most relevant media."

This is the second global client for Landry Communications, which last year conducted a comprehensive brand study for Reos Partners, a social benefit consultancy with offices on five continents.

 

Click's Customer Development Interview Template/Script

Image Credit: Faakhir Rizvi

Image Credit: Faakhir Rizvi

Click's Lean Launchpad: Pioneer Valley students have been making great progress on their customer development interviews.  We started with this simple and effective starter template from Jason Evanish.  When our teams were ready to up their sophistication, they did some research and put together a more extensive set of templates, shared below...

 

Problem Interview

  • Welcome / Up Front Contract (2 min)

    • Thank them!

    • Explain you are doing research on a new product idea.  You are not selling anything.  You just want to learn from their experience.

    • You will be happy to answer their questions about what you have learned so far (if they have interest) - do this to communicate this is a 2-way street and you are up for GIVING as well as GAINING.

    • Explain time you plan to use (and stick to it)

  • Collect Customer Segment data (2 min)

    • Ask questions to verify they are in your target market!

    • Secure any demographic/psychographic data called for given your target market.

  • Pain Overview (5-15 min)

    • “I’m focusing on [problem area]”

    • “When we have spoken with others like you, we often find they are experiencing [Pain 1], [Pain 2], and/or [Pain 3].  Do any of these apply to you?”

    • “Are there other important problems you have that I didn’t mention?”

    • “How would you rank these problems, from most important to least?”

    • Tip: use index cards to make it easy for them to remember the pains and yo arrange them in priority order.

  • Pain Deep Dive (15-30 min)

    • Start with the highest ranked problem.

    • “How do you deal with this problem?”

    • “What is the impact of this problem on you?”

    • Repeat for other problems as time allows.

  • Wrap up (2 min)

    • Ask if you can follow up afterwards should you get interesting results or make progress towards a potential solution.

    • Ask who else you should speak to and if they would be OK referring you.

    • Thank them, profusely!

    • Document everything right afterwards, while it is fresh.

Solution Interview

  • Welcome / Up Front Contract (2 min)

    • Thank them!

    • Explain you are doing research on a new product idea.  You have a crude prototype suitable only for demonstrating core concepts - in other words you are not selling anything.  You just want to learn from their experience.

    • You will be happy to answer their questions about what you have learned so far (if they have interest) - do this to communicate this is a 2-way street and you are up for GIVING as well as GAINING.

    • Explain time you plan to use (and stick to it)

  • Collect Customer Segment data (2 min)

    • Ask questions to verify they are in your target market!

    • Secure any demographic/psychographic data called for given your target market.

  • Review Pain (2 min) - Summarize what you heard from them before “After speaking to you and a lot of people like you, we heard again and again that you experience [Pain 1], [Pain 2], and [Pain 3].  These problems cause [impact].  Does that sound about right?” - you want to make sure they agree before you proceed! If they don’t, this is important to learn NOW.

  • Demo (15 min)

    • For the pain they ranked most highly, show your mockup screens of what a solution would look like and the value it would deliver.  

    • Check for questions.

    • Repeat for other problem areas.

    • “Which portion of the solution was most compelling?  Least?  Why?”

    • “What is missing?”

  • Test pricing (3 min)

    • Try out your guestimate price.

    • Notice their immediate reaction.

      • If they say yes, but hesitate, you probably have it right.

      • If they say yes right away, your price is too low.

      • If they say no ask what price they feel is fair (note what people SAY they think is fair is less than what they will actually be willing to pay).

    • For products with high switching costs, ask if they would use it if it were free.

  • Wrap-up

    • Ask if they would be interested in being in a service trial once you build it.

    • Ask for referrals.

    • Thank them, profusely!

    • Document everything right away while it is fresh.

Find a GoogleDoc version of this template here.

Note: the above template is heavily influenced by this awesome Chicago Lean Startup Circle presentation.