Know Your Customer
Get out from behind the desk and talk to the people you want to serve.
What this stage means
In Stage 1, you wrote down your best guesses: who has the problem, how much it hurts, and what they'd want instead. Stage 2 is where you find out if those guesses are true, and there's only one way to do it. Real conversations with real potential customers.
This is customer discovery. Not surveys sent into the void, not asking your friends if they like your idea, but sitting down with the people you plan to serve and learning how they experience the problem today. How do they currently handle it? What have they tried? What would make them switch? What would they pay?
The founders who skip this stage build products nobody asked for. The founders who lean into it walk away with something priceless: a customer profile built on evidence, language pulled straight from customers' mouths, and the confidence that comes from knowing instead of hoping.
What to do in this stage
Build your interview list
Identify 25 to 30 people who match your target customer from Stage 1. Tap your network, local events, social media, and warm introductions. Aim to complete 15 to 20 conversations.
Write a question guide
Ask about their life and the problem, not your idea. "Tell me about the last time you dealt with ___" beats "Would you use an app that ___?" every time. Past behavior is evidence. Polite predictions are not.
Run the conversations
Keep them to 20 or 30 minutes, listen more than you talk, and resist the urge to pitch. Take notes on exact phrases people use. Their words will become your marketing later.
Look for patterns
After every few interviews, review your notes. What keeps coming up? Which pains are sharpest? A pattern you hear three or more times is worth taking seriously.
Rebuild your customer profile
Update your Lean Canvas and customer description based on what you actually heard. If the evidence points somewhere different than you expected, follow it. That's the process working.
Signs you're making progress
- You've completed 15 to 20 discovery interviews with people who match your target customer, not just friends and family.
- You've documented patterns that showed up across at least three separate conversations.
- Your customer profile is rebuilt on evidence, describing who they are, how they handle the problem today, and what they care about most, in their own words.
- You can name the pain point customers ranked highest, and it might not be the one you started with.
You're ready for Stage 3 when...
You've heard the problem described in your customers' own words enough times that you could finish their sentences. You know who feels it most, what they've already tried, and what "better" would look like to them. Now you have what you need to build something small and put it in front of them, because Stage 3 is where your solution meets reality.
Local resources for this stage
Launch Greensboro
Events and founder meetups where your target customers, and founders who've done discovery before, are already in the room.
SBTDC at NC A&T and UNCG
Free counseling and market research support to help you find and understand your target market.
SCORE Piedmont Triad
Mentors who can review your interview questions and help you make sense of what you're hearing.
Greensboro Public Library Business Resources
Free databases for market data and building lists of businesses and contacts to interview.