Ask HN: How to do customer development for online retail industry? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How to do customer development for online retail industry?

4 pointsadityakothadiya3 comments

Hi HN,

As a part of customer development process, I want to talk to online/eCommerce retailers, or specifically their marketing folks to understand the tools/services they are using for social media marketing.

I have certain ideas but haven't started developing the product. Before I start that, I want to know if they need this kind of product, and if yes, how they foresee using it and what things (features) they care most about.

But I hardly know anyone in eCommerce/online retail industry, so how should I reach out to my customers? Shall I just email them to their Contact email and ask for in-person meeting? Shall I just cold-call them? Or follow/communicate via Twitter? Or shall I look for some introductions?

Also, if you work in online retail industry or know someone who works, then your help in introducing me to appropriate person will be highly appreciated. Please send me an email to aditya dot kothadiya at gmail.com or write in the comments below.

Thanks, Aditya

Hi aditya, take a look at this presentation for some tips.

http://www.slideshare.net/storymix/lean-startup-meetup

Also, cold calling, twitter, looking for introductions or emailing directly are all possible ways to reach your potential customers. One of the primary ideas of customer development is testing hypothesis. One of these hypothesis is how you plan to reach your customers, if there are customers out there. This is a good time to test that marketing hypothesis as well.

Articulating your message clearly to indicate what the person has to gain from talking to you or what the win for him/her is might be a good idea too.

I would try reaching out to the founders of these companies. They will recognize your email right away as a customer development effort and will sympathize with your cause since they were in your shoes one before.

One thing I've done in the past is just show up. I've found that people are more defensive on the phone since the only time we get calls from people we don't know is sales calls. Show up, ask to speak to them for 2 minutes if they are free and set up a meeting at a future time. If they aren't free, leave a handwritten note.

Thanks! This sounds a great advice. Will work on this.

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