2026-10-24 –, Room 332
Whether you want to explore launching a new open-source project, dip your toe into freelance work, or identify a good startup idea, getting direct input from many potential users or customers will ensure that your venture is received with enthusiasm and receives the support necessary to be sustainable over the long term. Unlike user experience research that asks about specific features of specific software already in development, customer discovery is a process of learning what the customer most needs and wants. In this session, the presenter will conduct and debrief several abbreviated interviews to demonstrate effective techniques for uncovering valuable unexpected data to inform new ventures and pivots.
It’s important not to start a business or project that serves other people with assumptions of what they want and need.
Most people are agreeable. If you ask them, “Do you like this tool? Would you buy/use it?”, they will show enthusiasm. It can be painful (and sometimes expensive!) to realize that all those people were just being nice. Even if they had good intentions, they never had the drive to go out of their way to use or buy the software, hardware, or service you worked so hard to develop.
So how do you find out what people will really buy or use? Customer discovery is a semi-structured method for identifying what really motivates potential customers. The goal is to discover what would motivate the customer so strongly that it would be worth abandoning a routine: It could be switching to an open-source tool, hiring you as a freelancer, or buying a product.
The presenter has been coaching a team of local techies interested in starting a worker-owned cooperative in Seattle. The group has recently conducted dozens of customer discovery interviews. Members of this team will play the role of customer in the live demo interviews. Audience members will also have the option to volunteer to be interviewed.
This demo session will start with a hypothesis about a customer need: “If [product/service] solves [problem] then [specific type of customer] will adopt the solution.” The audience will learn how to document and analyze the interview data to support or disprove the hypothesis.
The customer discovery process takes practice, but is not particularly complex, and audience members should leave the session with the knowledge to conduct and analyze their own interviews.
Jocelyn Graf is an Entrepreneur in Residence at the University of California Riverside and advises small businesses remotely from Seattle through the Los Angeles Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs). Jocelyn's expertise includes helping tech startup founders refine business ideas and explore whether they are viable. She also helps founders integrate people, planet, and profit. Jocelyn is an avid cyclist and advocate for Big Tech alternatives.