What I learnt from Running Experiments to create a new Product Management Class

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Coming up with the idea of a new class, we had a Hypothesis "We believe that most Product Leaders and Entrepreneurs use no or light evidence to test their business idea" Our first validation approach was to conduct customer interviews. Our hypothesis would be validated if we get over 80% of our target customer segment sharing.

Check out more details about our detailed experimentation plan and how you can create one in my previous newsletter https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-leverage-ai-build-satellite-strategy-your-product-jaising-cst--mzg1e/​

My initial customer segment were Entrepreneurs and Small Investors running or investing a small business(s). From my LinkedIn connections, I conducted several customer interviews on Zoom.

My Test Card

I interviewed 10 small business owners and 3 investors. I used the Jobs To Be Done Technique and Card to better understand pain points. Below card has a summary of the key pain points I heard.

Summary of my interview with an investor and business owner was

Investor's Project Portfolio Overview

He described his role as an investor and promoter, explaining that he spends about 20% of his time on various projects, including a dentist solution, wine promotion, and healthcare initiatives. He noted that the dentist solution is still in development and not yet ready for client testing, while the wine promotion involves organizing events and gathering feedback through purchase metrics. The focus is on securing a large client for the dentist solution before expanding further, estimating it could take at least six months to deploy the solution effectively.

Customer Interview for Product Validation

Investors shared their experience with product development, mentioning his involvement in a digital transformation company developing healthcare technology that was sold in 2023, and his current involvement in early-stage projects.

He discussed his approach to evaluating new business ideas, focusing on whether they solve existing problems and have the potential for traction and scalability. He shared his experience with Tech Health inc., a healthcare technology venture from 2016, which he found promising due to the industry's lag in digital transformation and the solution's alignment with market needs. They emphasized the importance of a strong team and product in early-stage ventures, as well as understanding the problem's significance and the buyer's priorities. He also highlighted challenges in validating ideas, such as the mixed reception of a clinical communication product for doctors and the competitive nature of the health supplement market.

Key learning

The interviews proved us wrong. There were several validation techniques like client demand, a successful sale of a company in the past and interest in wine tasting events. So about 50% of our customer segment had some or the other way they validated their business idea. We had a target of 80% response rate. Although I did not hear of a methodical experimentation plan followed by anyone

We changed our hypothesis to "We believe that most Product Leaders and Entrepreneurs do not have a methodical experimentation plan to validate their business idea"

For the new hypothesis we did two things

1. Create a survey in https://maven.com for a new validation course. I am sharing the results captured from a point in time.

I started reaching out to and conducting interviews with people interested in sharing their experiences in detail. This was our way to move from light evidence to medium evidence.

A summary Jobs To Be Done Interview is below for the refined hypothesis

Based on this customer interview, the Product leader's primary jobs to be done center around accelerating and improving product validation processes before committing significant resources to development. She needs tools and methods to thoroughly validate customer needs and market demand across multiple markets (she mentioned expanding to 30 new markets), particularly for digital products targeting older, less tech-savvy audiences. Michelle is seeking ways to automate workflow processes and gather meaningful customer feedback more efficiently, as she faces challenges with high email marketing costs and limited access to target customer contact information. Additionally, she wants to combine product ownership expertise with digital marketing to drive adoption more effectively, and is interested in AI-powered tools that can help simulate user behavior, create personas, and provide tangible validation outputs like test cards and checklists that she can use immediately in her consulting work and product development process

Key Learning

The series of interviews helped us improve our hypothesis to

"We believe that most Product Leaders and Entrepreneurs do not have a methodical experimentation using AI to validate their business idea"

"We believe that Entrepreneurs need to quickly create opportunities like landing pages, offers and sales channels using AI"

Using these hypothesis we interviewed to market leaders, product trainers and coaches that are selling successfully to mid and large size organizations.

Both the hypothesis resonated with them and their clients have a strong need for better organizing their product teams and a scientific approach to testing business ideas with AI improving the speed of the tests.

This discovery has helped us confirm we start using strong evidence by listing and selling a class called "Idea to Revenue for Entrepreneurs and Product Leaders"

Announcement for this class coming in my newsletter... Stay Tuned

If you are interested in learning how to use the techniques used in this newsletter sign up for my Scrum Alliance Advanced Certified Product Owner Certification Workshop - https://www.eventbrite.com/cc/advanced-certified-scrum-product-owner-a-cspo-2770959 Run Live Online once a month.

Anil Jaising, ​CST®​ On a mission to help Entrepreneurs and Product Leaders THRIVE, Unpack Product Innovation with AI Trainer, Product Consultant and International Speaker Follow me for real life case studies and learning videos.