June 24, 2024 • 26 mins
Ever wondered how to what the best way is to get feedback from your customers? Gathering useful user feedback for products in development is a critical step to building the right stuff. In this episode, we share creative strategies, such as involving children and parents for initial testing and how to set up an active engaged user group on social media. At the end of the day, the trick is to create a safe environment that triggers real, honest feedback from your audience.
Special mentions:
Dr. Ellen Langer, Harvard’s renowned ‘Mother of Mindfulness
Mauricio Dujowich
Tip of the week:
Ira: Advice from Mauricio
Stacee: Advice on making decisions
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Ira (00:04):
Hello and welcome.
I am Ira Gordon and, along withStacee Santi, the host of the
Accidental Entrepreneurs Podcast.
We each previously foundedsuccessful companies Along the
way.
We became business owners andeventually sold those businesses
despite us having no realbackground in business or ever
even planning to becomeentrepreneurs.
In other words, we did this alldespite originally having no
(00:25):
idea what we were doing orgetting ourselves into.
In each episode of this podcast, we will share stories and tips
from our journey and we'llanswer a randomly chosen
question about our experience.
Let's jump right into the show.
Good day, S tacee.
How have you been?
Stacee (00:43):
Good, how are you, I ira ?
Nice to see you.
Ira (00:46):
I am doing well.
It's wonderful to see you too.
What is new on the side of theworld?
Stacee (00:53):
Well, we're getting ready to make the trek back to
Colorado with the six horses,four chickens, two dogs and one
cat.
So that's top of mind for us atthe moment.
Ira (01:07):
Wow, is this like rustling everybody up and riding across
Great Plains, or is this loadingup some gigantic set of
vehicles?
Stacee (01:16):
Yeah, we have to take two trucks and trailers to get
everyone from Arizona over toColorado.
So my husband asked me to drivea truck and trailer and I was
like I don't think that's a goodidea.
I don't feel good about that.
He's like how hard is it?
I'm like I would only be ableto go in a straight line.
I'll tell you, I'm sure I canfigure it out, but our kiddo
(01:40):
came to town to help us do that.
So I've been waiting to talk toyou because I wanted to tell
you about this study I just cameacross.
It's about okay.
So they took these students atthe university and they had them
(02:01):
write some opinion aboutsomething it could be anything
and then they told him theiropinion was going to be reviewed
by the professor.
So the professor, regardless ofwhat anybody wrote, the comment
was something like this isterrible idea.
I can't believe we even havestudents at this college that
(02:21):
think this way.
Ira (02:23):
You see professors like that.
Stacee (02:26):
And then the students.
Ira (02:27):
Maybe I was just a subject of an experiment and nobody told
me.
Stacee (02:30):
Yeah, you didn't even know.
And then the students weregiven two options.
One is they could crumple it upand throw it away.
The other is put it in a drawer.
And then they did a post reviewof their emotional state I
can't remember how long laterand what they discovered is the
(02:54):
people that drew it away hadpretty much forgot about it or,
like had such almost a completeresolution of their anger, and
the people that put it in thedrawer were still angry about it
.
And I keep thinking about thatand how you know for sure, being
a veterinarian but also beingan entrepreneur, how you get
(03:16):
people tell you negative thingsthat I mean I know.
One time at my first trade show, this guy walked up and he goes
this is the dumbest idea I'veever heard and like holding on
to that is so toxic.
And so they just said that youshould.
The recommendation is, if youget negative interaction with
(03:39):
someone, you should actuallywrite it down and then crumple
it up and chuck it.
Ira (03:45):
Interesting.
So I'm thinking about myexperiences driving and being
treated less than kindly by someof my fellow drivers from time
to time.
And, as you probably know, I'ma pretty zen, even keeled, kind
of guy most of the time, butsometimes things just really
drive you nuts because they'redangerous or rude or all of the
(04:08):
above.
And most of the time, you know,I hold it in, especially now
that I'm often driving with kids.
But a few times in my life I'mgoing to admit that I have said
and gestured aggressively afterthese things have happened and
I'm not necessarily proud of it.
But I would say, man, it feelspretty good, you know, like you
(04:34):
get it all out, you get it overwith, and as long as nothing bad
comes of it, it does kind ofmake you feel better, I gotta
say.
Stacee (04:43):
Yeah, that's probably a good way to use it.
Ira (04:47):
What do you do in the heat of the moment, when you're
really upset about something?
Stacee (04:52):
Oh, I'm Italian, so it's not good I've had to train
myself.
I usually go like some peoplethink and are nervous to
confront people.
I've always been the opposite.
I will jump the gun and get inthere and be like what the heck?
And just blah, blah, blah andthen think about it later.
(05:14):
My, my key employee, karen, andlongtime friend.
She always used to tell me we,we need less aim.
Point out of you.
That's usually what I do.
I try to think about thingslonger now, like give it 24
(05:34):
hours.
If you're still mad, then gofor it.
Ira (05:36):
So people tell me that it's the opposite, that they can
tell I'm really mad when I getreally quiet.
Oh, yeah, yeah, I'm really madwhen I get really quiet.
Um, yeah, but uh, but the truthis nobody really knows this,
but I'm a thrower.
Um, I just never throw thingsat people or when people can see
me, usually, um, and so I'mreally mad.
(05:57):
Like, you know, there was amistake in the clinic.
I just can't believe we screwedsomething up, or uh, you know,
or something like that.
This just got me really upset.
Like I will go somewhere andfind something and throw it
really hard at something.
I'm pretty good about notbreaking anything, or at least
breaking anything other than thevery cheap thing I'm throwing,
(06:18):
but that is how I tend to dealwith things when I'm
extraordinarily upset.
Stacee (06:23):
I can't even see you being mad, you're so nice.
Ira (06:26):
Yeah, no, that's what most people would say.
I can just tell when you'rereally quiet that you're really
upset about something.
But sometimes I get reallyquiet, I find someplace else
quiet and I throw something.
It's my little secret.
Be aware, if Ira gets quiet andleaves the room, something's
going to happen If you see Iralike quiet in a hallway or
(06:47):
something like don't look in thehallway, you might be about to
throw something.
Stacee (06:52):
Well, let's jump into today's topic.
The question of the week is howdid you get feedback on your
product in Iterate?
Ira (07:14):
What a great question and I think it can vary.
In my experience varied a lotbased on sort of the stage of
the product.
I think in the very earliest ofstages what we tend to do is
just give it to friends to useand ask what they thought, ask
(07:35):
what they thought could bebetter, ask what they didn't
like and try to use that toimprove.
The team we had everybody usethe product as much as we could
and try to break things.
That's always been somethingI've loved doing since I was a
little kid is like trying tofigure out the glitches and
video games and that kind ofthing, and so that suits me well
(07:56):
.
And you know, a little bitlater on I think we of course
would always listen to users.
Once you have users it gets tobe a little bit easier and
ultimately we sort of formalizedthat process and brought on a
head of sort of user experiencethat was tasked with talking to
our users, talking toprospective users and giving
(08:18):
them the product to use andasking for feedback or asking
about ideas, all those sorts ofthings for feedback or asking
about ideas, all those sorts ofthings.
But it can be pretty tricky,especially if you have a product
that's not really that usableyet or that you're embarrassed
to show to people because it'snot quite there yet.
Finding people that you trustthat are still relevant to the
product.
Your friends might not be users.
(08:39):
My wife is not a veterinarian.
I can't ask her to use a testprep tool for veterinary
students.
She just has no domainknowledge to give relevant
feedback, so that can be alittle tricky.
How about you?
Stacee (08:53):
Yeah, similar.
Some of my first early, earlyusers were actually my kids and
their friends.
They were like about 10 yearsold and I'd always seem to have
this group of boys at my house,you know, playing in the summer
and hanging out.
And I'm working on the productearly on, and one like I'll
(09:15):
never forget.
One of the features we had waswhere a client could share a
picture of their pet into theapp, and I was trying to come up
with a name, and so I'd bakecookies for the boys and I bring
them in and I'd say, all right,what's a good name for this?
And we all came up with a.
Well, they came up with selfieshots.
(09:36):
I'm like, okay, that's a goodname, and then I'd start testing
things on them because they'reso good with technology.
They knew all the latest andwhat's not cool and what is cool
.
So I was always floating ideas.
So they were probably my firstuser group.
Isn't that so funny A bunch oflittle kids.
(09:56):
It advanced, though, of course,as we grew the company and
started going.
The first level of users for ustesters was always my team and
my parents.
I find that sometimes it'sabout the content and what
you're trying to do, but a lotof times it's about the user
(10:18):
experience and if you can figureit out without having to read
an instruction booklet.
Like were you shocked when youget your iPhone and there is no
instruction booklet?
Ira (10:30):
Thought about it.
I know I wouldn't read it if itwas there.
Stacee (10:33):
I mean, I used to look for it because I wanted to know
how to do something, and then Irealized, okay, this has to be
so simple that you wouldn't readthe booklet, even if you had it
.
As the company got bigger andthe product got bigger, one of
the things we knew we had to begood at was being connected to
our top users and be able to getfeedback.
(10:56):
So we played around with acouple of different ways to do
this, but we ultimately foundthe biggest success in a private
Facebook group.
We set this up and when yousigned up for our platform,
anybody that was using theplatform could be in the user
group.
And we try to do fun things inthe user group.
It can't just be all you know,taking information from your
(11:20):
customers.
So we would give random prizesout, we would have videos, you
know, like fun stuff.
We'd even had a mascot, mrMeowgi, and he would dance to
songs like Hammer Time, and sowe tried to make it a balance of
fun and positivity, so then wecould get a big following in
(11:44):
there.
And then when we needed userfeedback, we could drop features
there.
So we'd usually drop featuresearly in that group and kind of
give them early access, whichthey found cool because they're
in the VIP club, but what wewere really after was their
feedback so they could test itfirst.
So you're just kind of justtargeting your early adopters
(12:08):
and telling them we really needyour feedback on this.
Ira (12:13):
Love that approach and you followed one of my, I think,
secret rules of productdevelopment.
I want to take credit for this,but I probably shouldn't.
But I have this rule that youoftentimes are faced with a
choice when building a productbetween making something more
fun versus making it more useful, and my rule is always choose
more fun.
Yeah, and my role is alwayschoose more fun.
(12:35):
Yeah, because fun is whatactually drives people to use
the product.
And, as useful as something is,if it's not fun to use,
nobody's going to use it andnobody's going to get the
usefulness of it.
And probably in part because mybias is towards trying to make
things logical and useful, I say, whenever you are thinking
(12:55):
about that choice, always makeit more fun, I say whenever you
are thinking about that choice,always make it more fun.
Stacee (12:59):
Well, you know it's so funny you say that is.
We spent an insane amount oftime listening to cat meows and
dog barks because I wanted thenotification tone to be or we
have to hear it over and overand over again.
Right, that's a big deal it overand, over and over again, right
, so it's a big deal.
Well, then it came.
(13:19):
Then this debate came up about.
All right, let's say you have ahousehold with dogs and cats.
What if the notification was adog sound, but it might scare
the cat?
Or should it the default be thecat meow, which we all suppose
the dog would enjoy?
Uh, so we ended up.
The default was the cat meowfor a multi-species home.
Ira (13:42):
Very, very good design thinking there, Stacee.
Stacee (13:45):
Isn't that clever?
I also want to say a word ortwo about how you approach your
client for getting feedback, oryour customer, because one thing
I think happens that you needto be aware of is people are
generally nice, especially ifthey see how much you care about
(14:07):
something.
They may not feel inclined totell you the truth if it sucks,
and so you really have to createa safe environment for them to
give you feedback so they don'tworry about hurting your
feelings.
So a lot of times that meansthe founder can't do this
because they really don't wantto hurt your feelings and make
(14:30):
you sad, especially if you'vebeen working a long time on
something.
So any tips for that, I ira?
Ira (14:41):
Well, I have a few thoughts .
I would say one thing that lotsof people try to do that I
think works really poorly mostof the time is surveys.
I think that you get a veryskewed population of people that
even respond to surveys, thatthey're asked specific questions
, and you just oftentimes getmisleading and or not very
(15:02):
actionable information.
Stacee (15:03):
I think doing the same survey you know on a cadence
over and over again to try toidentify, you know, trends
within that sort of sameexperience, if you will, is a
good thing to do, but if you'reactually looking for useful
feedback, I think that's a wasteof time Most of the time,
especially if you pay the enduser for a survey or or put them
(15:26):
in a drawing for somethingbecause think about it their
goal is, prop like it could beto really help you, but it could
just be to get the free thing,and so they're going to go
through the survey as quickly aspossible just to complete it,
and then you might be makingcritical decisions based on that
person that wasn't even reallythat interested in doing the
(15:49):
survey for helping you.
Ira (15:52):
I think there is a lot of validity in what you shared
regarding having maybe a moredetached person seek some of
that feedback instead of thefounder.
But I'm going to disagree alittle bit and say that
outsourcing that when it'sreally important can lead to a
lot of things maybe gettingmissed or lost in translation as
well, and I think when you'relooking for maybe more specific
(16:16):
feedback, that might be great,but when you need, you know,
really insightful commentary, Ithink it's something that you
really can't outsource to a, youknow, upper manager or lower
level person.
I think it has to be a founderor leader doing it.
Founder or leader doing it, andyou really need to go into
(16:41):
those conversations, even thoughyou think there's something
specific that you want to know.
That's not what you should beasking about, right, you need to
just kind of figure out, likeyou know what was, you know what
are their problems and is yourproduct actually meaningfully
solving that problem?
When you ask specific questionsabout like well, what was this
like and what was this like, youmay be spending a lot of time
fixing things that are notactually important things, right
(17:03):
, and so, depending on kind ofthe stage of your company and
the type of feedback that youneed.
I think that can really meandifferent things for who should
be sort of gutting thoseinterviews and I say interviews
and not surveys specifically,and what types of questions you
should be asking, and the moreopen-ended the better.
Stacee (17:28):
Totally.
That's why I love that.
Don't lead the witness.
Ira (17:30):
If you lead the witness, they'll tell you what you want
to hear.
Stacee (17:32):
Yeah, don't lead the witness.
I really loved that Facebookgroup because what ended up
happening is you put it outthere and say you have first
access.
We really want to hear yourthoughts, share them in the
comments, and we'd have a fewthings happen.
You know, some people would belike I love this so much.
(17:53):
Other people would say, well,what about this?
And if one person said it,other people felt more
comfortable to chime in on itand we could see a trend.
And then some people would say,well, this is a great, but why
aren't you working on this forus?
And then we're like, okay, andthen we would say who else feels
(18:16):
this way?
And then we would say who elsefeels this way?
And the other thing I did withmy roadmap is, you know, we
would meet every day with theengineers, but on Mondays we
would be going through the, youknow, sprint of the week or the
month or whatever, like what arewe working on right now?
And on the back end, karen andI were constantly triaging what
(18:38):
we're going to be building nextor fixing, and then I would post
those things in the Facebookgroup.
I would say here is the order ofthe next five things coming
down the pipe and do you agreewith the order?
And people would give me lotsof comments know, oh, we want
this feature.
(18:58):
I'm like, okay, do you want itbefore this or after this one?
It's like the eye doctor test.
You're like A or B, because Ican't do it all.
So you tell me, do you wantchat first or do you want, you
know, to customize some reminderfirst?
And no, we want chat.
Okay, perfect.
So that's the order.
(19:19):
And it was nice because peopleare always asking you for more
and you can just say, well,here's the plan.
And we published it and Ithought it worked really well.
Some people were nervous likecompetitors would get it, but
I'm like I don't really careabout that competitors would get
(19:39):
it, but I'm like I don't reallycare about that.
Ira (19:41):
We used to have this dynamic where we always wanted
to build, you know, lots ofdifferent cool things into our
product.
I think that's probably the waya lot of founders are, and so
we would just start talkingabout wanting to do this, I want
to do this, I want to do this,and and our partner, who was
software developer, yeah, hewould eventually stop us and he
would just sort of say, okay,guys, like let's just pretend
(20:03):
we've got, you know, these eightboxes of these eight different
ideas we're talking about, andI'm giving you one golden token
and you get to put it in one boxthat you want me to build.
Which one's it gonna be?
And that was a very difficultexercise for us.
Stacee (20:19):
It's hard, it's hard.
That's why I think a lot ofpeople bite off more than they
can chew.
They get too many things goingon and they aren't able to
control the roadmap.
That well, okay.
(20:48):
Well, let's hop over to ourfavorite part of the program,
where we will share a tip ortrick or tool or quote what do
you got for us today?
Ira (20:53):
I would love to recognize somebody I can't believe I
haven't called out during thissegment yet, and that is my very
best friend and first businesspartner, M mauricio, who has
taught me way more than onecould imagine and, you know,
frankly, been one of the mostimportant things in my life,
both related and unrelated tostarting a company, and I think
(21:14):
what he taught me more thananything was to kind of be bold
and, instead of really askingthe question of you know, why
should I do this?
Or you know like it was like,you know why not us that sort of
notion?
of if nobody else is doingsomething that we know we need,
why shouldn't we be the ones?
(21:34):
And you know, I had a lot ofanswers to that question, like
because we're dumb and we'restudents and we don't know what
we're doing and there's lots ofsmarter people and we've never
done this before and all thosethings.
But yeah, I think he reallytaught me like those are all
stupid excuses, Like they make aton of sense to me, but the
reality is they're stupidexcuses and if you really want
(21:56):
to figure something out and doit, you can.
Stacee (22:05):
Yeah, that's really good .
How about you, S stacey?
I'm going to share just a tipfor when you're overwhelmed with
decision-making.
Like, just decide.
I mean it sounds easy andsimple, but actually just make a
decision.
Gather the information asquickly as possible.
First you might have to figureout what information to gather,
get it and make the decision,even if you don't know what the
(22:29):
right decision is like.
You will spend so much timetrying to not make a mistake
that you lose precious time whenyou could be moving forward and
trust your gut.
I mean, I think if you have agood pulse on the problem and
you know what you're buildingkind of your end game you got to
(22:53):
believe in yourself at some ofthese points, because people
will doubt you.
They will want to get morefocus groups together and more
information and while all ofthat is, I'm not saying it's bad
, but sometimes there are justso many decisions to make You're
just going to have to make adecision and go.
Ira (23:15):
Love it.
I have a.
I was saying that peopleusually get, but occasionally it
backfires when, um, there's toomuch discussion about something
which is, uh, I say maybe weshould form a committee.
And anybody that knows me knowsthat that is absolutely not
said seriously, cause there'snothing that I probably sort of
(23:39):
viscerally dislike more thanhaving to form a committee to
figure something out that justneeds to get figured out.
Occasionally, somebody agreeswith me when I say something and
when I say that, and it reallybackfires, but most of the time
it helps.
Stacee (23:53):
Well, you know, there was a lady I was listening to
recently and she said just flipa coin on some of these things,
Because you know what.
You don't know what the otherchoice would have been anyways.
Dr. Ellen Langer (24:07):
Rather than waste your time being stressed
over making the right decision,make the decision right.
Randomly choose.
Now you can randomly choose ifyou want an Almond Joy or a
Snickers.
Nobody's going to care.
Right?
It's the exact same thing aboutgetting married or not, taking
the job or not.
(24:28):
You can only live one life.
If there were some magical waythat I could live a life as
somebody who's had three kidsand somebody who hasn't had kids
, maybe I can make a comparison.
But you don't have thatavailable to you.
So I say to my students shouldyou go to Harvard or should you
go to Yale?
So they made a decision to goto Harvard.
So let's say it's terrible.
(24:49):
Oh, I wish I had gone to Yale.
There's no way of knowing thatYale wouldn't have been worse,
better the same.
And that's why regret is somindless, because the choice you
(25:10):
didn't take, you're presumingwould have been better.
Stacee (25:16):
All right, well, let's spin the wheel and we'll see
what the question is for nextweek.
Ira (25:20):
Let's do it.
How did you decide on titles?
Stacee (25:29):
Oh man, I've changed so many people's titles so many
times because I had no idea whatI was doing.
Ira (25:36):
My goodness, this is like my least favorite topic.
Stacee (25:43):
I can't wait to discuss it.
All right, we'll see you nextweek, take care.
out episodes two and three,and if you are an accidental
entrepreneur and would like tobe a guest co-host on the show
and spin the wheel, just messagebeacohost no spaces to
1-833-463-9727 and tell us yourstory.
(26:08):
See you next time.
Hello and welcome.
I am Ira Gordon and, along withStacee Santi, the host of the
Accidental Entrepreneurs Podcast.
We each previously foundedsuccessful companies Along the
way.
We became business owners andeventually sold those businesses
despite us having no realbackground in business or ever
even planning to becomeentrepreneurs.
In other words, we did this alldespite originally having no
(00:25):
idea what we were doing orgetting ourselves into.
In each episode of this podcast, we will share stories and tips
from our journey and we'llanswer a randomly chosen
question about our experience.
Let's jump right into the show.
Good day, S tacee.
How have you been?
Stacee (00:43):
Good, how are you, I ira ?
Nice to see you.
Ira (00:46):
I am doing well.
It's wonderful to see you too.
What is new on the side of theworld?
Stacee (00:53):
Well, we're getting ready to make the trek back to
Colorado with the six horses,four chickens, two dogs and one
cat.
So that's top of mind for us atthe moment.
Ira (01:07):
Wow, is this like rustling everybody up and riding across
Great Plains, or is this loadingup some gigantic set of
vehicles?
Stacee (01:16):
Yeah, we have to take two trucks and trailers to get
everyone from Arizona over toColorado.
So my husband asked me to drivea truck and trailer and I was
like I don't think that's a goodidea.
I don't feel good about that.
He's like how hard is it?
I'm like I would only be ableto go in a straight line.
I'll tell you, I'm sure I canfigure it out, but our kiddo
(01:40):
came to town to help us do that.
So I've been waiting to talk toyou because I wanted to tell
you about this study I just cameacross.
It's about okay.
So they took these students atthe university and they had them
(02:01):
write some opinion aboutsomething it could be anything
and then they told him theiropinion was going to be reviewed
by the professor.
So the professor, regardless ofwhat anybody wrote, the comment
was something like this isterrible idea.
I can't believe we even havestudents at this college that
(02:21):
think this way.
Ira (02:23):
You see professors like that.
Stacee (02:26):
And then the students.
Ira (02:27):
Maybe I was just a subject of an experiment and nobody told
me.
Stacee (02:30):
Yeah, you didn't even know.
And then the students weregiven two options.
One is they could crumple it upand throw it away.
The other is put it in a drawer.
And then they did a post reviewof their emotional state I
can't remember how long laterand what they discovered is the
(02:54):
people that drew it away hadpretty much forgot about it or,
like had such almost a completeresolution of their anger, and
the people that put it in thedrawer were still angry about it
.
And I keep thinking about thatand how you know for sure, being
a veterinarian but also beingan entrepreneur, how you get
(03:16):
people tell you negative thingsthat I mean I know.
One time at my first trade show, this guy walked up and he goes
this is the dumbest idea I'veever heard and like holding on
to that is so toxic.
And so they just said that youshould.
The recommendation is, if youget negative interaction with
(03:39):
someone, you should actuallywrite it down and then crumple
it up and chuck it.
Ira (03:45):
Interesting.
So I'm thinking about myexperiences driving and being
treated less than kindly by someof my fellow drivers from time
to time.
And, as you probably know, I'ma pretty zen, even keeled, kind
of guy most of the time, butsometimes things just really
drive you nuts because they'redangerous or rude or all of the
(04:08):
above.
And most of the time, you know,I hold it in, especially now
that I'm often driving with kids.
But a few times in my life I'mgoing to admit that I have said
and gestured aggressively afterthese things have happened and
I'm not necessarily proud of it.
But I would say, man, it feelspretty good, you know, like you
(04:34):
get it all out, you get it overwith, and as long as nothing bad
comes of it, it does kind ofmake you feel better, I gotta
say.
Stacee (04:43):
Yeah, that's probably a good way to use it.
Ira (04:47):
What do you do in the heat of the moment, when you're
really upset about something?
Stacee (04:52):
Oh, I'm Italian, so it's not good I've had to train
myself.
I usually go like some peoplethink and are nervous to
confront people.
I've always been the opposite.
I will jump the gun and get inthere and be like what the heck?
And just blah, blah, blah andthen think about it later.
(05:14):
My, my key employee, karen, andlongtime friend.
She always used to tell me we,we need less aim.
Point out of you.
That's usually what I do.
I try to think about thingslonger now, like give it 24
(05:34):
hours.
If you're still mad, then gofor it.
Ira (05:36):
So people tell me that it's the opposite, that they can
tell I'm really mad when I getreally quiet.
Oh, yeah, yeah, I'm really madwhen I get really quiet.
Um, yeah, but uh, but the truthis nobody really knows this,
but I'm a thrower.
Um, I just never throw thingsat people or when people can see
me, usually, um, and so I'mreally mad.
(05:57):
Like, you know, there was amistake in the clinic.
I just can't believe we screwedsomething up, or uh, you know,
or something like that.
This just got me really upset.
Like I will go somewhere andfind something and throw it
really hard at something.
I'm pretty good about notbreaking anything, or at least
breaking anything other than thevery cheap thing I'm throwing,
(06:18):
but that is how I tend to dealwith things when I'm
extraordinarily upset.
Stacee (06:23):
I can't even see you being mad, you're so nice.
Ira (06:26):
Yeah, no, that's what most people would say.
I can just tell when you'rereally quiet that you're really
upset about something.
But sometimes I get reallyquiet, I find someplace else
quiet and I throw something.
It's my little secret.
Be aware, if Ira gets quiet andleaves the room, something's
going to happen If you see Iralike quiet in a hallway or
(06:47):
something like don't look in thehallway, you might be about to
throw something.
Stacee (06:52):
Well, let's jump into today's topic.
The question of the week is howdid you get feedback on your
product in Iterate?
Ira (07:14):
What a great question and I think it can vary.
In my experience varied a lotbased on sort of the stage of
the product.
I think in the very earliest ofstages what we tend to do is
just give it to friends to useand ask what they thought, ask
(07:35):
what they thought could bebetter, ask what they didn't
like and try to use that toimprove.
The team we had everybody usethe product as much as we could
and try to break things.
That's always been somethingI've loved doing since I was a
little kid is like trying tofigure out the glitches and
video games and that kind ofthing, and so that suits me well
(07:56):
.
And you know, a little bitlater on I think we of course
would always listen to users.
Once you have users it gets tobe a little bit easier and
ultimately we sort of formalizedthat process and brought on a
head of sort of user experiencethat was tasked with talking to
our users, talking toprospective users and giving
(08:18):
them the product to use andasking for feedback or asking
about ideas, all those sorts ofthings for feedback or asking
about ideas, all those sorts ofthings.
But it can be pretty tricky,especially if you have a product
that's not really that usableyet or that you're embarrassed
to show to people because it'snot quite there yet.
Finding people that you trustthat are still relevant to the
product.
Your friends might not be users.
(08:39):
My wife is not a veterinarian.
I can't ask her to use a testprep tool for veterinary
students.
She just has no domainknowledge to give relevant
feedback, so that can be alittle tricky.
How about you?
Stacee (08:53):
Yeah, similar.
Some of my first early, earlyusers were actually my kids and
their friends.
They were like about 10 yearsold and I'd always seem to have
this group of boys at my house,you know, playing in the summer
and hanging out.
And I'm working on the productearly on, and one like I'll
(09:15):
never forget.
One of the features we had waswhere a client could share a
picture of their pet into theapp, and I was trying to come up
with a name, and so I'd bakecookies for the boys and I bring
them in and I'd say, all right,what's a good name for this?
And we all came up with a.
Well, they came up with selfieshots.
(09:36):
I'm like, okay, that's a goodname, and then I'd start testing
things on them because they'reso good with technology.
They knew all the latest andwhat's not cool and what is cool
.
So I was always floating ideas.
So they were probably my firstuser group.
Isn't that so funny A bunch oflittle kids.
(09:56):
It advanced, though, of course,as we grew the company and
started going.
The first level of users for ustesters was always my team and
my parents.
I find that sometimes it'sabout the content and what
you're trying to do, but a lotof times it's about the user
(10:18):
experience and if you can figureit out without having to read
an instruction booklet.
Like were you shocked when youget your iPhone and there is no
instruction booklet?
Ira (10:30):
Thought about it.
I know I wouldn't read it if itwas there.
Stacee (10:33):
I mean, I used to look for it because I wanted to know
how to do something, and then Irealized, okay, this has to be
so simple that you wouldn't readthe booklet, even if you had it
.
As the company got bigger andthe product got bigger, one of
the things we knew we had to begood at was being connected to
our top users and be able to getfeedback.
(10:56):
So we played around with acouple of different ways to do
this, but we ultimately foundthe biggest success in a private
Facebook group.
We set this up and when yousigned up for our platform,
anybody that was using theplatform could be in the user
group.
And we try to do fun things inthe user group.
It can't just be all you know,taking information from your
(11:20):
customers.
So we would give random prizesout, we would have videos, you
know, like fun stuff.
We'd even had a mascot, mrMeowgi, and he would dance to
songs like Hammer Time, and sowe tried to make it a balance of
fun and positivity, so then wecould get a big following in
(11:44):
there.
And then when we needed userfeedback, we could drop features
there.
So we'd usually drop featuresearly in that group and kind of
give them early access, whichthey found cool because they're
in the VIP club, but what wewere really after was their
feedback so they could test itfirst.
So you're just kind of justtargeting your early adopters
(12:08):
and telling them we really needyour feedback on this.
Ira (12:13):
Love that approach and you followed one of my, I think,
secret rules of productdevelopment.
I want to take credit for this,but I probably shouldn't.
But I have this rule that youoftentimes are faced with a
choice when building a productbetween making something more
fun versus making it more useful, and my rule is always choose
more fun.
Yeah, and my role is alwayschoose more fun.
(12:35):
Yeah, because fun is whatactually drives people to use
the product.
And, as useful as something is,if it's not fun to use,
nobody's going to use it andnobody's going to get the
usefulness of it.
And probably in part because mybias is towards trying to make
things logical and useful, I say, whenever you are thinking
(12:55):
about that choice, always makeit more fun, I say whenever you
are thinking about that choice,always make it more fun.
Stacee (12:59):
Well, you know it's so funny you say that is.
We spent an insane amount oftime listening to cat meows and
dog barks because I wanted thenotification tone to be or we
have to hear it over and overand over again.
Right, that's a big deal it overand, over and over again, right
, so it's a big deal.
Well, then it came.
(13:19):
Then this debate came up about.
All right, let's say you have ahousehold with dogs and cats.
What if the notification was adog sound, but it might scare
the cat?
Or should it the default be thecat meow, which we all suppose
the dog would enjoy?
Uh, so we ended up.
The default was the cat meowfor a multi-species home.
Ira (13:42):
Very, very good design thinking there, Stacee.
Stacee (13:45):
Isn't that clever?
I also want to say a word ortwo about how you approach your
client for getting feedback, oryour customer, because one thing
I think happens that you needto be aware of is people are
generally nice, especially ifthey see how much you care about
(14:07):
something.
They may not feel inclined totell you the truth if it sucks,
and so you really have to createa safe environment for them to
give you feedback so they don'tworry about hurting your
feelings.
So a lot of times that meansthe founder can't do this
because they really don't wantto hurt your feelings and make
(14:30):
you sad, especially if you'vebeen working a long time on
something.
So any tips for that, I ira?
Ira (14:41):
Well, I have a few thoughts .
I would say one thing that lotsof people try to do that I
think works really poorly mostof the time is surveys.
I think that you get a veryskewed population of people that
even respond to surveys, thatthey're asked specific questions
, and you just oftentimes getmisleading and or not very
(15:02):
actionable information.
Stacee (15:03):
I think doing the same survey you know on a cadence
over and over again to try toidentify, you know, trends
within that sort of sameexperience, if you will, is a
good thing to do, but if you'reactually looking for useful
feedback, I think that's a wasteof time Most of the time,
especially if you pay the enduser for a survey or or put them
(15:26):
in a drawing for somethingbecause think about it their
goal is, prop like it could beto really help you, but it could
just be to get the free thing,and so they're going to go
through the survey as quickly aspossible just to complete it,
and then you might be makingcritical decisions based on that
person that wasn't even reallythat interested in doing the
(15:49):
survey for helping you.
Ira (15:52):
I think there is a lot of validity in what you shared
regarding having maybe a moredetached person seek some of
that feedback instead of thefounder.
But I'm going to disagree alittle bit and say that
outsourcing that when it'sreally important can lead to a
lot of things maybe gettingmissed or lost in translation as
well, and I think when you'relooking for maybe more specific
(16:16):
feedback, that might be great,but when you need, you know,
really insightful commentary, Ithink it's something that you
really can't outsource to a, youknow, upper manager or lower
level person.
I think it has to be a founderor leader doing it.
Founder or leader doing it, andyou really need to go into
(16:41):
those conversations, even thoughyou think there's something
specific that you want to know.
That's not what you should beasking about, right, you need to
just kind of figure out, likeyou know what was, you know what
are their problems and is yourproduct actually meaningfully
solving that problem?
When you ask specific questionsabout like well, what was this
like and what was this like, youmay be spending a lot of time
fixing things that are notactually important things, right
(17:03):
, and so, depending on kind ofthe stage of your company and
the type of feedback that youneed.
I think that can really meandifferent things for who should
be sort of gutting thoseinterviews and I say interviews
and not surveys specifically,and what types of questions you
should be asking, and the moreopen-ended the better.
Stacee (17:28):
Totally.
That's why I love that.
Don't lead the witness.
Ira (17:30):
If you lead the witness, they'll tell you what you want
to hear.
Stacee (17:32):
Yeah, don't lead the witness.
I really loved that Facebookgroup because what ended up
happening is you put it outthere and say you have first
access.
We really want to hear yourthoughts, share them in the
comments, and we'd have a fewthings happen.
You know, some people would belike I love this so much.
(17:53):
Other people would say, well,what about this?
And if one person said it,other people felt more
comfortable to chime in on itand we could see a trend.
And then some people would say,well, this is a great, but why
aren't you working on this forus?
And then we're like, okay, andthen we would say who else feels
(18:16):
this way?
And then we would say who elsefeels this way?
And the other thing I did withmy roadmap is, you know, we
would meet every day with theengineers, but on Mondays we
would be going through the, youknow, sprint of the week or the
month or whatever, like what arewe working on right now?
And on the back end, karen andI were constantly triaging what
(18:38):
we're going to be building nextor fixing, and then I would post
those things in the Facebookgroup.
I would say here is the order ofthe next five things coming
down the pipe and do you agreewith the order?
And people would give me lotsof comments know, oh, we want
this feature.
(18:58):
I'm like, okay, do you want itbefore this or after this one?
It's like the eye doctor test.
You're like A or B, because Ican't do it all.
So you tell me, do you wantchat first or do you want, you
know, to customize some reminderfirst?
And no, we want chat.
Okay, perfect.
So that's the order.
(19:19):
And it was nice because peopleare always asking you for more
and you can just say, well,here's the plan.
And we published it and Ithought it worked really well.
Some people were nervous likecompetitors would get it, but
I'm like I don't really careabout that competitors would get
(19:39):
it, but I'm like I don't reallycare about that.
Ira (19:41):
We used to have this dynamic where we always wanted
to build, you know, lots ofdifferent cool things into our
product.
I think that's probably the waya lot of founders are, and so
we would just start talkingabout wanting to do this, I want
to do this, I want to do this,and and our partner, who was
software developer, yeah, hewould eventually stop us and he
would just sort of say, okay,guys, like let's just pretend
(20:03):
we've got, you know, these eightboxes of these eight different
ideas we're talking about, andI'm giving you one golden token
and you get to put it in one boxthat you want me to build.
Which one's it gonna be?
And that was a very difficultexercise for us.
Stacee (20:19):
It's hard, it's hard.
That's why I think a lot ofpeople bite off more than they
can chew.
They get too many things goingon and they aren't able to
control the roadmap.
That well, okay.
(20:48):
Well, let's hop over to ourfavorite part of the program,
where we will share a tip ortrick or tool or quote what do
you got for us today?
Ira (20:53):
I would love to recognize somebody I can't believe I
haven't called out during thissegment yet, and that is my very
best friend and first businesspartner, M mauricio, who has
taught me way more than onecould imagine and, you know,
frankly, been one of the mostimportant things in my life,
both related and unrelated tostarting a company, and I think
(21:14):
what he taught me more thananything was to kind of be bold
and, instead of really askingthe question of you know, why
should I do this?
Or you know like it was like,you know why not us that sort of
notion?
of if nobody else is doingsomething that we know we need,
why shouldn't we be the ones?
(21:34):
And you know, I had a lot ofanswers to that question, like
because we're dumb and we'restudents and we don't know what
we're doing and there's lots ofsmarter people and we've never
done this before and all thosethings.
But yeah, I think he reallytaught me like those are all
stupid excuses, Like they make aton of sense to me, but the
reality is they're stupidexcuses and if you really want
(21:56):
to figure something out and doit, you can.
Stacee (22:05):
Yeah, that's really good .
How about you, S stacey?
I'm going to share just a tipfor when you're overwhelmed with
decision-making.
Like, just decide.
I mean it sounds easy andsimple, but actually just make a
decision.
Gather the information asquickly as possible.
First you might have to figureout what information to gather,
get it and make the decision,even if you don't know what the
(22:29):
right decision is like.
You will spend so much timetrying to not make a mistake
that you lose precious time whenyou could be moving forward and
trust your gut.
I mean, I think if you have agood pulse on the problem and
you know what you're buildingkind of your end game you got to
(22:53):
believe in yourself at some ofthese points, because people
will doubt you.
They will want to get morefocus groups together and more
information and while all ofthat is, I'm not saying it's bad
, but sometimes there are justso many decisions to make You're
just going to have to make adecision and go.
Ira (23:15):
Love it.
I have a.
I was saying that peopleusually get, but occasionally it
backfires when, um, there's toomuch discussion about something
which is, uh, I say maybe weshould form a committee.
And anybody that knows me knowsthat that is absolutely not
said seriously, cause there'snothing that I probably sort of
(23:39):
viscerally dislike more thanhaving to form a committee to
figure something out that justneeds to get figured out.
Occasionally, somebody agreeswith me when I say something and
when I say that, and it reallybackfires, but most of the time
it helps.
Stacee (23:53):
Well, you know, there was a lady I was listening to
recently and she said just flipa coin on some of these things,
Because you know what.
You don't know what the otherchoice would have been anyways.
Dr. Ellen Langer (24:07):
Rather than waste your time being stressed
over making the right decision,make the decision right.
Randomly choose.
Now you can randomly choose ifyou want an Almond Joy or a
Snickers.
Nobody's going to care.
Right?
It's the exact same thing aboutgetting married or not, taking
the job or not.
(24:28):
You can only live one life.
If there were some magical waythat I could live a life as
somebody who's had three kidsand somebody who hasn't had kids
, maybe I can make a comparison.
But you don't have thatavailable to you.
So I say to my students shouldyou go to Harvard or should you
go to Yale?
So they made a decision to goto Harvard.
So let's say it's terrible.
(24:49):
Oh, I wish I had gone to Yale.
There's no way of knowing thatYale wouldn't have been worse,
better the same.
And that's why regret is somindless, because the choice you
(25:10):
didn't take, you're presumingwould have been better.
Stacee (25:16):
All right, well, let's spin the wheel and we'll see
what the question is for nextweek.
Ira (25:20):
Let's do it.
How did you decide on titles?
Stacee (25:29):
Oh man, I've changed so many people's titles so many
times because I had no idea whatI was doing.
Ira (25:36):
My goodness, this is like my least favorite topic.
Stacee (25:43):
I can't wait to discuss it.
All right, we'll see you nextweek, take care.
out episodes two and three,and if you are an accidental
entrepreneur and would like tobe a guest co-host on the show
and spin the wheel, just messagebeacohost no spaces to
1-833-463-9727 and tell us yourstory.
(26:08):
See you next time.
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