The Mom Test: How to talk to customers & learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you

by Rob Fitzpatrick

The truth is our goal and questions are our tools.

It’s not anyone else’s responsibility to show us the truth. It’s our responsibility to find it.

The Mom Test is a set of simple rules for crafting good questions that even your mom can't lie to you about.

A useful conversation The measure of usefulness of an early customer conversation is whether it gives us concrete facts about our customers’ lives and world views.

We find out if people care about what we’re doing by never mentioning it. Instead, we talk about them and their lives.

The Mom Test: Talk about their life instead of your idea Ask about specifics in the past instead of generics or opinions about the future Talk less and listen more

People know what their problems are, but they don’t know how to solve those problems.

"Is there anything else I should have asked?"

Compliments are the fool’s gold of customer learning: shiny, distracting, and worthless.

When you hear a request, it’s your job to understand the motivations which led to it.

Questions to dig into feature requests: “Why do you want that?” “What would that let you do?” “How are you coping without it?” “Do you think we should push back the launch to add that feature, or is it something we could add later?” “How would that fit into your day?”

Questions to dig into emotional signals: “Tell me more about that.” “That seems to really bug you — I bet there’s a story here.” “What makes it so awful?” “Why haven’t you been able to fix this already?” “You seem pretty excited about that — it’s a big deal?” “Why so happy?” “Go on.”

Everyone has problems they know about, but don’t actually care enough about to fix.

“What are your big goals and focuses right now?”

Start broad and don't zoom in until you’ve found a strong signal, both with your whole business and with every conversation.

3 separate meetings: the first about the customer and their problem; the second about your solution; and the third to sell a product.

Commitment — They are showing they’re serious by giving up something they value such as time, reputation, or money. Advancement — They are moving to the next step of your real-world funnel and getting closer purchasing.

Steve Blank calls them earlyvangelists (early evangelists). In the enterprise software world, they are the people who: Have the problem Know they have the problem Have the budget to solve the problem Have already cobbled together their own makeshift solution

If it sounds weird to unexpectedly interview people, then that’s only because you’re thinking of them as interviews instead of conversations.

The only thing people love talking about more than themselves is their problems.

If it’s a topic you both care about, find an excuse to talk about it. Your idea never needs to enter the equation and you’ll both enjoy the chat.

7 degrees of bacon The world is a relatively small place. Everyone knows someone. We just have to remember to ask.

Kevin Bacon’s 7 degrees of separation applies to customer conversations. You can find anyone you need if you ask for it a couple times.

Vision / Framing / Weakness / Pedestal / Ask

The mnemonic is “Very Few Wizards Properly Ask [for help].”

Getting specific about your ideal customers allows you to filter out all the noise which comes from everyone else.

If you aren’t finding consistent problems and goals, you don’t have a specific enough customer segment.

Emotions :) Excited :( Angry :| Embarrassed

Their life ☇ Pain or problem (symbol is a lightning bolt) ⨅ Goal or job-to-be-done (symbol is a soccer/football goal) ☐ Obstacle ⤴ Workaround ^ Background or context (symbol is a distant mountain) These five “life” symbols are

Specifics ☑ Feature request or purchasing criteria ＄ Money or budgets or purchasing process ♀ Mentioned a specific person or company ☆ Follow-up task

The Mom Test: Talk about their life instead of your idea Ask about specifics in the past instead of generics or opinions about the future Talk less and listen more

Writing it down — signal symbols: :)Excited :( Angry :|Embarrassed ☇ Pain or problem (symbol is a lightning bolt) ⨅ Goal or job-to-be-done (symbol is a soccer/football goal) ☐ Obstacle ⤴Workaround ^Background or context (symbol is a distant mountain) ☑ Feature request or purchasing criteria ＄Money or budgets or purchasing process ♀ Mentioned a specific person or company ☆ Follow-up task

Asking for and framing the meeting: Vision — half-sentence of how you’re making the world better Framing — where you’re at and what you’re looking for Weakness — where you’re stuck and how you can be helped Pedestal — show that they, in particular, can provide that help Ask — ask for help

Startups are more craft than science.

if you’re in the business of supporting, training, mentoring, or investing in startups, I work with a few other founders building educational curriculum (slides, workshops, videos, facilitation guides, etc) at foundercentric.com. Download resources, join the mailing list, and get involved. We’ve run training from Costa Rica to Kiev with folks ranging from Oxford to the UN. Get in touch at hello@foundercentric.com.

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