A practical guide to customer discovery
The core idea
Most founders build first, then look for customers. That’s the problem. Before worrying about growth, ads or landing pages, you need one thing: conversations with people who already feel the pain you’re solving. Not demos, not pitches.
You need real conversations.
Twenty of those conversations will tell you more about your market than eighteen months of guessing.
PART 1. WHERE TO FIND THEM
The key distinction most people miss: you’re not looking for where your audience hangs out. You’re looking for where they complain.
There’s a big difference. A LinkedIn group is where people hang out. A thread titled “why does X keep breaking our workflow” is where they complain. That’s your place.
Where to look:
Reddit. Search for your problem directly, not your solution. Look for threads where people describe frustration, workarounds or failed attempts. The more specific the complaint, the better.
G2, Capterra and similar review sites. Filter for 2 to 4 star reviews of tools adjacent to yours. People writing those reviews are frustrated enough to spend time explaining why. That’s exactly the energy you’re looking for.
LinkedIn comments. Not posts, comments. Posts are polished. Comments under posts about industry problems are where people say what they actually think.
Niche Slack and Discord communities. Every industry has them. Find the ones where practitioners talk daily, not the ones that exist for networking.
Facebook groups. Underrated. Especially in non-tech industries. Look for groups around a specific job role or problem, not a general interest.
What you’re looking for in all of these:
Someone who has tried to solve the problem already and failed. Someone using workarounds. Someone who mentions spending money on a solution that didn’t work. Phrases like “we’ve tried three tools,” “we’re doing this manually” or “this is a constant headache” are signals that the pain is real and commercial, not just mildly annoying.
PART 2. HOW TO REACH OUT
The message that works is not clever. It’s specific and it’s human.
The formula: Reference exactly what they said. Show you’re not cold. Ask for a conversation, not a demo.
Template:
“Hey [name] — I came across your comment about [specific thing they said]. I’m researching how people are dealing with this problem and I’d love to understand your experience better. No pitch, no product to show you — just trying to learn. Would you be open to a 15 minute chat?”
That’s it. The reason it works is that you’re responding to something they already said publicly. You’re not cold, you’re relevant. Response rates are completely different from generic outreach.
What to avoid:
❌ Don’t mention your product in the first message. Not even a hint. The moment you do, it becomes a sales call and they disengage.
❌ Don’t send the same message to everyone. The reference to what they specifically said is the whole point. A generic version of this message doesn’t work.
❌ Don’t ask for more than 15 minutes. It’s a low commitment ask. You can always go longer if the conversation is good.
PART 3. WHAT TO ASK IN THE CONVERSATION
The goal of these conversations is not to validate your idea. It’s to understand their reality. There’s a big difference. Go in curious, not hoping to hear yes.
The five things you need to find out:
1. Is the pain real or just theoretical?
Ask them to tell you about the last time this problem caused them actual trouble. Not “does this problem exist” but “tell me what happened.” Real pain has a story. Theoretical pain doesn’t.
Look for: people who have already tried to fix it and failed. That’s the strongest signal. If they haven’t tried anything, the problem probably isn’t urgent enough.
Questions to ask:
- “How are you dealing with this right now?”
- “Have you tried anything to fix it? What happened?”
- “How often does this come up?”
2. Have they already paid for a solution?
This is underrated and most people skip it. If someone has never spent money trying to solve this problem, you’re asking them to do something new. If they’re already paying for something, even something they hate, the problem is commercially proven.
Questions to ask:
- “Are you currently using anything to help with this?”
- “Have you paid for anything to solve this before?”
3. What words do they use?
Don’t talk. Listen. The exact phrases they use to describe their frustration are more valuable than any copywriter. Your landing page, your emails, your outreach, all of it should use their language, not yours. You cannot guess this. You have to hear it.
Write down their exact phrases verbatim. Not your interpretation of what they said. Their actual words.
4. Who has the budget?
The person who feels the pain most is often not the person who can pay for the solution. You need to understand both: who suffers daily and who approves the spend. Ask directly.
Questions to ask:
- “If you found something that solved this, who would need to approve buying it?”
- “Is this something you could decide on yourself or does it involve others?”
5. What does solved look like?
Not “it would save time.” Specifically: what would they be able to do on a Tuesday afternoon that they can’t do now? The more concrete their answer, the more useful it is. This becomes your positioning, your case study and your sales argument all at once.
Questions to ask:
- “If this problem disappeared tomorrow, what would change for you?”
- “What would a good solution actually look like in practice?”
PART 4. WHAT TO DO WITH WHAT YOU LEARN
After twenty conversations, patterns will emerge. You’ll start hearing the same phrases, the same workarounds, the same frustrations. That’s your market telling you what to build and how to talk about it.
The first paying customers almost always come from these conversations directly. At some point, if the fit is right, the conversation naturally becomes:
“Based on everything you’ve told me, we’re building something aimed at exactly this. Would you be open to being an early customer while we finish it?”
When the pain is real and the fit is tight, this doesn’t feel like a pitch. It feels like relief.
THE ONE THING TO REMEMBER
You’re not looking for where your audience hangs out. You’re looking for where they complain. Find the frustration first. Everything else follows from there.