Leadership · Phase 1: searching
Searching: who really has the problem?
This month you'll have five conversations about what customers actually did, and afterwards you'll know which problem you solve and for whom.
Worth reading first: The five growth phases
Does this sound familiar?
- Everyone says 'interesting', 'good idea' or 'send me something'. Nobody signs.
- A customer buys once, and after that you hear nothing.
- Your proposal looks different every month, because you tweak something after every conversation.
- Asked who your customer is, you say 'pretty much anyone with a business'.
- You've been building for months, and in that time you've spoken to three potential customers.
Who it's for, and when
For anyone bringing something new to market: their own business, a new product, or a new service alongside what's already running. People find it interesting, a few buy once, but nobody comes back or asks for it. You've just entered this phase when you have the first reactions and don't yet know what they mean. You're nearly through it when customers buy a second time without being asked and you can say who they are.
The model
“Do things that don't scale.”
In Searching you ask the market one question: what's the problem, and who really has it? Really means they've already tried to do something about it, spent time or money on it, and remember the last time it went wrong. Someone who only recognises the problem when you name it doesn't really have it.
You answer that question with conversations and small experiments. You don't ask customers what they think of your idea, because then they're being kind. You ask what they did last time, what it cost and what they've already tried. You write down what you think is true as a hypothesis, and you test it this week. A three-year plan doesn't make sense yet: it rests on assumptions you haven't tested.
What usually holds you back here is a habit from your last job. There you were rewarded for a good plan, a finished product and a polished proposal. In this phase it's too early to finish things. If you perfect your product before you've spoken to customers, you're finishing something nobody has asked for yet.
Boldcaster, the growth phase model (2026), boldcaster.com/groeifasen. Talking to customers about their past comes from Steve Blank (customer development, 2005) and Rob Fitzpatrick (The Mom Test, 2013); 'do things that don't scale' from Paul Graham (2013).
Your strategy
A list of hypotheses: who has the problem, how often, what it costs them now, and what they'd pay. Each week you test one with conversations or a small experiment, and you cross out what turns out to be wrong. You don't commit to anything for years yet.
You as a leader
You listen and you experiment. You talk less about your solution and ask more about their work. A rejection is information. You do a lot by hand, even when it isn't efficient, because that's how you see where it hurts.
The people around you
You, and at most one or two people who can turn their hand to anything: calling, building, delivering. Everyone talks to customers. Fixed roles and job titles don't make sense yet; you don't know what work there'll be.
Your system and AI
Quickly making something you can show: a mock-up, a landing page, a trial run by hand. AI helps you make in a day what used to take a month, and lets you put your conversation notes side by side. A system to run the business comes later.
Pitfalls
Structuring too early, building for too long
You set up an organisation, write processes and design a logo while you still don't know who's buying. Or you keep polishing the product, because that feels safer than properly questioning customers. Both take months, and in that time the market hasn't told you anything.
Counting your friends and network as proof
Former colleagues and acquaintances say yes because they know you. That's kind of them, and it says little about the market. Only count what you hear from people you don't know who have the problem.
Watch and read
In five minutes Fitzpatrick explains how to ask a customer what they actually did, instead of what they think of your idea. That's the conversation you're having in this phase.
Watch on YouTubeWhy you win and help your first customers by hand, even though it can't stay that way later on.
Watch on YouTubeTo go further
How to prepare customer conversations, which questions to ask and what to do with the answers afterwards.
Watch on YouTubeRead
The Mom Test: How to talk to customers & learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you
Rob Fitzpatrick · 2013 · ISBN 9781492180746
The handbook for customer conversations in this phase: which questions to ask, which to avoid, and how to tell when someone's just being nice. Short, about 130 pages, done in an evening.
View the bookApply it
- 1
Write down three hypotheses
Who has the problem (as precisely as you can), how often they run into it, and what it costs them now in time or money. One sentence per hypothesis. Add which answer would surprise you.
- 2
Plan five conversations with people you don't know
Pick people who, by your hypothesis, have the problem. Ask for twenty minutes about their work, not for a demo. Five is enough to see patterns; after ten it's mostly repetition.
- 3
Ask about the past, and listen
Use the questions below. Only say what you're making at the end, if at all. Let them talk, summarise and keep asking: you'll learn that in the lesson Digging deeper.
Digging deeper - 4
Ask for something that costs something
A follow-up meeting with their boss, a paid trial, a deposit, access to their figures. If they say yes, they really have the problem. If they say 'send me something', you know that too.
- 5
Cross out and choose
Put the conversations side by side. Which hypothesis holds, which doesn't? Who was the problem sharpest for? Those people are your first clue to a core customer.
Your core customer
Examples
Software: a scheduling tool for childcare
A founder spent four months building a rota app and only heard 'nice' at demos. He stopped doing demos and asked ten nursery managers how they'd made last week's rota. The rota wasn't the problem. Finding cover when staff were off sick was: an hour on the phone every morning. In two weeks he built just that part, and three nurseries paid for the trial.
Services: a firm for grant applications
A consultant thought small businesses were missing out on grants because they didn't know about them. In conversations it turned out most business owners did know, and gave up at the reporting they had to do afterwards. Her service became that reporting, for a fixed fee. Anyone who'd ever done it themselves signed in the first conversation.
Manufacturing: a new line alongside the existing work
A metalworking company wanted to sell modular bike shelters to local councils. After six conversations it turned out purchasing went through tenders planned years ahead. At housing associations the need was greater and the decision quicker. They made the first shelter by hand for one housing association, at cost, and got two orders from it.
Ready to use: five questions for a customer conversation
1. When did you last run into this? Tell me what happened. 2. What did you do then? 3. What did that cost, in time or money? 4. What have you already tried to fix it, and why didn't that work? 5. Who else needs to have a say before you spend anything on this? Avoid: 'Would you use this?', 'What do you think of the idea?' and 'How much would you pay for it?'. Those questions get you polite answers.
Do this in your own business
Everything up to here is free. What you fill in for your own business, you keep in Boldcaster.
- You look back on a situation from your own work. Only you can read what you write.
- You set a date with yourself, and on that day the app asks how it went.
- You assign the lesson to your team and see who has done it.
- The quiz counts towards your progress, and you see which lesson comes next.
Four weeks free. You'll land straight in this lesson.
Quiz
5 situations. You need 4 of 5 right. You can try again at any time.
1.After a presentation, eight out of ten business owners say they find your idea 'really interesting'. Two ask if you'd email over some information. What do you know now?
2.You're talking to a buyer at a wholesaler about your idea for an ordering system. Which question tells you the most?
3.A bank asks for a three-year plan. You have two paying customers and don't yet know if they'll come back. What's sensible in this phase?
4.After six months your app is nearly finished. You've spoken to few customers, because you want to show something that works. What's the pitfall?
5.You want to help your first three customers with a report. You don't have software that makes it yet. What do you do?
Nothing is saved here. In the app, the quiz counts towards your progress.
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