pm-customer-interviews

Customer Interview Synthesis

Question bank and synthesis templates for product discovery interviews.

Interview Question Bank

Problem Discovery

- "Walk me through the last time you [did X]..."
- "What's the hardest part about [doing X]?"
- "Why is that hard?" (ask 3x - dig deeper)
- "What have you tried to solve this?"
- "What happened when you tried that?"

Current Solution Analysis

- "How do you handle [X] today?"
- "How often do you do this?"
- "What would happen if you couldn't do this?"
- "How much time/money does this cost you?"

Switching Signals

- "Have you looked for other solutions?"
- "What would make you switch?"
- "What's stopping you from switching now?"

Value Discovery

- "If you could wave a magic wand, what would change?"
- "What would that be worth to you?"
- "Who else cares about this problem?"

Interview Synthesis Template

## Interview: [Customer Name/Segment]
**Date:** YYYY-MM-DD | **Duration:** X min | **Role:** [Title]

### Problem Quotes (verbatim)
> "[Exact quote about the problem]"
> "[Another revealing quote]"

### Current Behavior
- Does [X] using [current solution]
- Frequency: [daily/weekly/monthly]
- Time spent: [X hours/month]

### Pain Intensity: [1-5]
- 1: Mild annoyance
- 3: Significant friction
- 5: "Hair on fire" problem

### Willingness to Pay Signal
- [ ] Actively searching for solutions
- [ ] Has budget allocated
- [ ] Named a specific price point: $___
- [ ] Would switch immediately if solved

### Key Insight
[One sentence capturing the non-obvious learning]

Interview Anti-Patterns

Anti-Pattern	Why It Fails	Instead Do
Leading questions	Confirms bias	Ask open-ended, follow "why"
Hypothetical pricing	People lie about future	Ask about current spending
Feature requests	Solutions, not problems	Dig for underlying need
Small sample	Anecdotes ≠ patterns	Require 5+ signals minimum

Output

After interviews, synthesize patterns across multiple conversations to identify:

• Common pain points (frequency + intensity)
• Willingness to pay signals
• Current solutions being "fired"