This document discusses the importance of understanding customers for startup success. It recommends using empathy mapping to get inside the customer's head and see things from their perspective. The document provides guidance on how to conduct empathy mapping, including questions to ask about what the customer sees, says, hears, thinks and feels. It also discusses identifying customer pains and gains. The overall message is that startups need deep customer insights before building products in order to create genuine value for customers.

2. Growth Hacker !
Biz Dev!
Co-Founder
Passionate about: Startups !
Technology!
Programming !
Online
Marketing
Past companies:

3. Keys To Startup Succes
“…4 areas you need to excel at in order to
maximise your success as a startup.”
- Sam Altman!
1. Idea: think of something people WANT
2. Product: build something people LOVE
3. Team!
4. Execution
http://startupclass.samaltman.Original text Sam Altman: com/courses/lec01/

4. Know Your Customers
Paul Graham: !
“What you need to know to succeed
in a startup is not expertise in
startups, what you need is expertise
in your own users.”!

5. Know Your Customers
Steve Blank: !
“No business plan survives first
contact with the customers.”!
!

6. How Do You Get To Know Your Customer?

7. Traditional
Marketing
Img. source: http://steinvox.com/blog/drucker-kottler-on-marketing-businesshow-have-we-drifted-from-fundamentals/

8. Focus Your Marketing On Your Customer
Product-focused marketing
Customer-focused marketing
Customer-Centric marketing
• I’m the expert
• I create the very best product
• I sell it to as many customers as
possible
• I look at what customer want
• I create products to meet their needs
• I build loyalty among my customers
• Customer experience (before & after
buying)
• Transparency
• Authenticity
• Relationship
!
=> create genuine value for your
customers

9. Empathy Mapping

10. How Can I Improve the Life of My Customers?
Get personal
Get inside his head
See things from their perspective
Put yourself in his shoes
Know him as you would a good friend!
!
REPEAT

11. Know you customer before
you start!
1. Define your customer
2. Empathy map goals:
What is their pain? =>
problem I want to solve
How am I solving their
problem? => my solution

12. Empathy Map
What really counts,
Major preoccupations,
Worries
Aspirations
Environment
Friends
What the market offers
Attitude in public
Appearance
Behaviour toward others
What family says
What friends say
What colleagues say
What boss says
What influencers say
Frustration
Fear
Obstacles
Problems
Wants
Needs
Measures of success
Obstacles
What is she THINKING?
What does she SEE?
What does she SAY and DO?
What does she HEAR?
Pain
Gain
Adapted from Alexander Osterwalder - Business Model Canvas (pg. 136)

13. Steps to mapping your customer:
1. Print the empathy map: link here
2. Use post-its to fill it in
3. Ask a lot of questions; no question is dumb
4. Get as many ideas as possible from the exercise
5. Put the entire map on a wall and analyse the ideas!
6. Sketch the main conclusions

14. Let’s get to work!

15. What Does She See?
Questions!
How is her environment?
How does it look like?
Who is around her?
Who are her friends?
Describe what the customer sees in her environment
What types of offers is she exposed to daily and
how is she exposed to them?
What problems does she deal with?
What is a typical day in their world?
Adapted from Alexander Osterwalder - Business Model Canvas (pg. 136)
Hint: use images to show her environment

16. What Does She Say And Do?
Questions!
Imagine what the customer might say, or how she might behave in public
What is her attitude?
What could she be telling others?
Pay attention to conflicts between what she says and how
she feels
Adapted from Alexander Osterwalder - Business Model Canvas (pg. 136)

17. What Does She Hear?
Questions!
What do her friends say?
How the environment influences the customer
What does her family say?
Who influences her and how?
What does she watch / listen to?
Which media channels are the most reachable?
What do they hear when other people complain about the same issue?
Adapted from Alexander Osterwalder - Business Model Canvas (pg. 136)
Hint: add links to sites she visits frequently

18. What Does She Think And Feel?
Questions!
Sketch out what goes on in your customer’s mind
What is really important to her? - private, not public
Imagine her emotions. What moves her?
What might keep her up at night?
What are her dreams and aspirations?
What worries her?
How do they think about their fears and hopes?
Adapted from Alexander Osterwalder - Business Model Canvas (pg. 136)

19. What’s The Pain - What’s The Gain?
PAIN: What keeps my customer up at night?!
Biggest frustrations?
Biggest obstacles between her and getting what she
needs or wants?
Which risks might she fear taking?
!
GAIN: What makes my customer wake up happy to?!
What does she truly want or need to achieve?
How does she measure success?
What strategies might she use to reach her goal?
What is she passionate about?
Adapted from Alexander Osterwalder - Business Model Canvas (pg. 136)

20. Example: a tourist
Source: http://blog.leanmonitor.com/empathy-map-step-client-shoes/

21. Conclusions & learnings:
• Do as much research as possible. You need to crawl into
your customer’s head
• Don’t show people your product - you want to find out
what’s in their heads, not to put things there
• Talk to who you need to talk to, not to whom is available
• Don’t get discouraged because the feedbacks doesn’t
meet the way you see your product. Listen and learn
• Remember: better a little pain now than a lot of pain
AFTER you built your product
Inspiration: Emmett Shear - How to Run a User Interview: http://startupclass.samaltman.com/courses/lec16/

22. What’s next?
• Steve Blank: The Startup Owner's Manual: The Step-By-Step Guide for Building a Great Company
• Alexander Osterwalder - Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers
• XPLANE: original designer of empathy map (xplane.com)
• Empathy map process: http://www.copyblogger.com/empathy-maps/
• Paul Graham’s blog
• YC Sam Altman’s Stanford Class: How to Start a Startup; especially chapter 16: Emmett Shear - How to Run a User
Interview: http://startupclass.samaltman.com/courses/lec16/
• Eric Ries - The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful
Businesses
• Steve Blank slides on Customer Discovery: http://www.slideshare.net/sblank/customer-discovery-23251533
• Millenials infograph: http://rgorsht.wordpress.com/tag/millenials/