Product Startup Podcast Episode 137: Get Better Customer Feedback at Launch

00:00:00 Kevin Mako: Hello, product innovators. Today we learned from a top feedback expert on how to get valuable customer insights from your physical product launch.

00:00:10 Narrator: You're listening to the Product Startup Podcast, the show that helps bring your product idea to life by chatting with successful inventors,

00:00:19 Narrator: product developers, manufacturers, and hardware industry professionals. Our goal here is to get to the bottom of what makes a product successful, from initial

00:00:28 Narrator: idea to getting your product on store shelves. We're taking you step by step to build. a functional product and scale your product business, hosted

00:00:37 Narrator: by Kevin Mako, one of North America's leading experts on hardware development for small product businesses. Now, onto the show.

00:00:47 Kevin Mako: Welcome back, everyone. Today I'm very excited to introduce Matt Selbie to the show. Matt is the

00:00:51 Kevin Mako: president of a pinnader, a software platform that collects real-time feedback from product customers. He's spent over 25 years researching, strategizing, and implementing customer

00:01:01 Kevin Mako: feedback programs. Today, Matt is going to share some valuable knowledge in how inventors startups and small manufacturers

00:01:06 Kevin Mako: should properly collect customer feedback, when to do it, how to do it, and the importance

00:01:10 Kevin Mako: of it, along with breaking down clear, actionable steps you can use for maximizing the right kind of feedback at your product launch. Now, on to the episode.

00:01:19 Matt Selbie: Hey, Matt, welcome to the pleasure.

00:01:21 Kevin Mako: Thank you very much indeed for having me on. Looking forward today to talking to you about feedback.

00:01:26 Kevin Mako: It's something that's very important to me, very important to hardware brands, especially as they're both getting the idea out to market.

00:01:33 Kevin Mako: And of course, once they do get to market, how do they maximize that customer feedback to help grow their brand and grow the product?

00:01:39 Kevin Mako: So what better person than to talk to you today about this? You're heavily involved in real-time customer feedback, which we'll get into.

00:01:45 Matt Selbie: But first and foremost, how did you get to where you're at today? You can probably tell I'm a Brit. We're based in Portland and Oregon. And my background is largely an oil and gas.

00:01:53 Matt Selbie: But I was always very interested in how any business can make decisions that are customer driven at what's called the point of experience.

00:02:02 Matt Selbie: So the point at which the product or the service is being consumed. So on the service level, it could be when you pick up your car from it being repaired

00:02:10 Matt Selbie: on the product level from you reviewing a bottle of water on the shelf or a new product. And the reason that that's important for you,

00:02:18 Matt Selbie: You and any business, certainly all of those that are listening here, is that without customer-driven

00:02:24 Matt Selbie: feedback, that is driven by those people that you want to buy your product, you won't grow because you'll just be making a guess as to what you think is

00:02:34 Matt Selbie: important, in my view, that'll never do you any good. And it's being sort of borne out by the statistics. So one of the alarming ones here in the US is that 90% of

00:02:43 Matt Selbie: all US businesses collect some form of customer feedback. That's the good news, at which point, Kevin, you might be popping open

00:02:50 Matt Selbie: the champagne, you're out of a job, your design firm goes to hell in a handbasket. The bad news is that only 10% of those 90 actually do anything

00:03:00 Matt Selbie: with the feedback. Now, can you imagine any other more colossal waste of customer resources and business resources? So I think the point to your

00:03:10 Matt Selbie: listeners is that as they think about product development, what are they doing to actively encourage

00:03:16 Matt Selbie: feedback and more importantly, what are they going to do with the feedback when it has been received?

00:03:24 Kevin Mako: So there's a collection phase and then there's an action phase. That's incredible because

00:03:29 Kevin Mako: amazing that the companies are actually going through the effort to collect this super valuable feedback. These are feedback data points from real customers helping

00:03:38 Kevin Mako: guide what they want for the future of the business. And yet so little of that actually turns into action. What is it that is kind of

00:03:46 Kevin Mako: the main problem here and how can a hardware startup that's emerging that's either trying to get their first product to market or maybe they're trying to leverage

00:03:56 Kevin Mako: their customers of their first product to release a second version of the product or increase the brand in any way that they see fit.

00:04:03 Kevin Mako: How can companies do this better, especially in the hardware space? And I know you've done a ton of work with retail chains, a ton of work with hardware companies that are actually

00:04:11 Kevin Mako: launching at exhibitions and how that actually can be kicked back, all this sort of stuff. So what can these hardware startups do to get great feedback?

00:04:19 Kevin Mako: And then, as you said, let's get into it down the road. How do they take action on that?

00:04:24 Matt Selbie: So let's start with collection first and then get to action later. Well, let me give you a how not to do it. So one of the things that I love to do is I ride motorcycles.

00:04:33 Matt Selbie: A few years ago, I actually bought a new motorcycle. That was all fine and dandy. But guess what, Kevin, six weeks after the event, after the purchase, I was called by

00:04:42 Matt Selbie: the motorcycle manufacturing company to say, first question was, quote, did the sales assistant explain all of the features on the three bikes that you tested?

00:04:52 Matt Selbie: Now, I don't know about you, Kevin.

00:04:54 Matt Selbie: I barely remember the names of my children. I certainly can't remember what I had for breakfast. So if you expect me to think about

00:05:01 Matt Selbie: the accuracy of some dude with spots who tried to sell me a motorcycle from six weeks ago, you've got no chance.

00:05:09 Matt Selbie: So the good news is, is they targeted the right customer. Clearly, I was in their consideration set because I'm in the store buying a bike. So the first thing that I

00:05:18 Matt Selbie: would say to your folk who are developing products is ask the right people. There is no point in

00:05:25 Matt Selbie: asking a broad array of the public unless you have a better sense of who is in your what is called a consideration set.

00:05:33 Matt Selbie: Who's likely to buy it? There's no point trying to ask me what I think about razors when you and I both have beards. Not a good start.

00:05:41 Matt Selbie: So the first thing is ask the right people. The second thing is ask as close to the experience as you possibly can.

00:05:51 Matt Selbie: So what would have been much better in that motorcycle example is asking me at the time of consideration. What was it

00:06:00 Matt Selbie: like trying to buy that motorcycle? So on a product side is ask them as they are using it, ask them

00:06:08 Matt Selbie: as they're trialing it, as they're feeling it, as they're reviewing it. And what is the functionality like. The problem that you find is the memory decays over time.

00:06:17 Matt Selbie: And so we know that at least 30% of the accuracy decreases within the first week. And we knew this because of all of the

00:06:27 Matt Selbie: work we did in retail. Asking somebody what happens a week ago, 30% of that is gone. So get your

00:06:34 Matt Selbie: folk to ask the questions at the point of experience or as close to as possible. The third thing is,

00:06:41 Matt Selbie: You know, we talk just now about the statistic about 90% and then 10% only ever do anything with it? Well, it's because that 80%, i.e.

00:06:49 Matt Selbie: the people who don't, ask really dumb questions,

00:06:54 Matt Selbie: breathtakingly stupid questions, either because they haven't thought about it or because they're using a survey methodology that's outdated.

00:07:01 Matt Selbie: And what we see a lot is someone will say, Kevin the boss will say to Matt, hey, get some customer feedback. And then Kevin's buddy will say,

00:07:09 Matt Selbie: hey, can you get some customer feedback as well? So you end up with this war and peace novel of ridiculous questions that's designed to confound and confuse.

00:07:18 Matt Selbie: So the first thing is ask the right person. The second is ask at the point of consideration. And then the third thing that should be

00:07:26 Matt Selbie: your beacon is what is it you want to find out? Don't ask for the world, but what specifically do you want to find out?

00:07:35 Matt Selbie: Do you want to find out about functionality, color, form? function, feel, what is it that you don't know that

00:07:44 Matt Selbie: is critical in order for you to make the next version of the product even better? And for crying out loud, even if you and your

00:07:52 Matt Selbie: folk on listening to the podcast, only remember one thing. It is do not ask more than one open-ended

00:08:00 Matt Selbie: question. Never, ever, ever ask more than one open-ended question. Because to reply to an open-ended

00:08:07 Matt Selbie: question like, hey, what do you think of the product, Kevin? Is very, very taxing on the person who's being asked because they have to go through their

00:08:16 Matt Selbie: brain and say, oh, well, what does that mean? What do I like? What do I dislike? It's very, very difficult. A much better question is about the color of the product.

00:08:25 Matt Selbie: What do you like? What have you seen better? Does this fit what the product is trying to convey?

00:08:32 Matt Selbie: So you break that response choice down into something that's much more manageable. and Kevin, of course, it's therefore able to be analyzed, because

00:08:42 Matt Selbie: once you get the feedback in, if you don't do any analytics on it, then why have you bothered? So I would think those are a few

00:08:50 Matt Selbie: things making sure that whatever you get in, you action, and then you ask, has this become any better? Has this changed it for the good?

00:08:59 Matt Selbie: And it's like a never-ending cycle, taking a product,

00:09:03 Kevin Mako: never really getting over the finishing line, but honing in on the right feature set. for that particular audience.

00:09:09 Kevin Mako: I love the fact that you broke it down into three key actionable items. The first two seem relatively simple to do, although a lot of people don't do it.

00:09:17 Kevin Mako: Asking the right people, number one, and asking them at the time. So assuming that those two are nailed, the third one is where it could get a bit strategic.

00:09:26 Kevin Mako: And that's where you're trying to ask the right questions.

00:09:29 Kevin Mako: So from what I understand from you, you want your questions to be very specific and maybe have one semi-open-ended question, but still be trying to be trying to.

00:09:37 Kevin Mako: to box in that open and question to deal with intent. I want to talk about intent a bit so we can break that down.

00:09:43 Kevin Mako: What sort of intent should a hardware company be looking for when you mean make sure that your questions are targeted? What exactly does that kind of mean and possibly

00:09:51 Matt Selbie: even some examples around that so that we can understand how to ask great questions in that kind of third portion of your three step process?

00:09:59 Matt Selbie: Sure. Intent is a really tricky item. It's you and I and everybody listening knows what intent means.

00:10:08 Matt Selbie: I know what the word means. But when you're asking people, what do you intend to do?

00:10:14 Matt Selbie: That's a really difficult question, even though they understand it, because I'm saying to you, Kevin, knowing that this widget is red, do you intend to

00:10:22 Matt Selbie: buy it? Kevin isn't buying it at the moment. And Kevin, when he wants to buy it, has now got a consideration set of products ABC.

00:10:30 Matt Selbie: And it may not be that red is the right color. So we have, I would really caution your audience into thinking about intent questions.

00:10:39 Matt Selbie: Rather focus on measurement of what's being done now into, is it blue or green? Blue, because you can measure that.

00:10:48 Matt Selbie: Please rate this on a scale of one through five, very efficient, inefficient, and so on. You can measure that. Be very careful

00:10:55 Matt Selbie: with intent questions because you get a lot of false positives. There's a famous one out there that you and your folk will have probably heard. It's called the net promoter.

00:11:05 Matt Selbie: question. The net promoter question is one that I am not a fan of, and I'll tell you why. And you remember,

00:11:12 Matt Selbie: Kevin, we just spoke about asking questions at the point of consumption, at the point of experience. Okay. So imagine you're at an exhibition hall.

00:11:20 Matt Selbie: Imagine you're staring at a product on the retail shelf. Asking someone on a scale of zero to 10, how likely are you to recommend this to a friend or

00:11:29 Matt Selbie: colleague is fraught with difficulty because it's an easy question to answer in front of a computer with a cup of coffee or a beer in one hand.

00:11:39 Matt Selbie: You can really think about it. In an environment where the response is going to be very limited, it's much harder. I don't know whether I'm going

00:11:47 Matt Selbie: to recommend this to my friends. Maybe I don't recommend anything to my friends. So my advice to you and the folk there is be

00:11:56 Matt Selbie: very, very careful when you have intent questions, particularly of the, if we changed it from blue to green, would you buy it?

00:12:04 Matt Selbie: Because I think that's going to give you spectacularly bad results. A much better question would be, is blue the right color?

00:12:12 Matt Selbie: And then ask why blue is the right color. And more to the point saying, if you weren't going to buy this blue widget, who is the

00:12:21 Matt Selbie: competitor that you are most likely to buy something of similar functionality from. Because now you've got something very, very hard and accurate.

00:12:30 Matt Selbie: And a better question after that is, so tell me out of these five reasons, why is it that you would choose brand X over you? So again, you're trying to limit the

00:12:40 Matt Selbie: amount of thinking time. You are trying to limit the amount of open-ended opportunity to describe

00:12:48 Matt Selbie: something in weasel words, which are very hard to interpret, and

00:12:52 Kevin Mako: you've tried to be very, very specific. So I know you are honing us down the intent road. I'm trying to shepherd you back on the non-intent road.

00:13:02 Kevin Mako: So keeping it clear, actionable, and essentially data-driven. I like how you mentioned as well that you're going to ask a question that you're really looking for the answer

00:13:10 Kevin Mako: for. And hopefully if you're a hardware startup, you've got a pretty clear either opportunity or pain point that you see. And you're trying to get real customer feedback.

00:13:16 Kevin Mako: You know, does this hurt your hand or does it not hurt your hand, you know, this device or whatever else? But then you're asking now for a secondary question in addition to that.

00:13:25 Kevin Mako: So the competitive question you ask is, if you're not buying my product and you are intending to buy a product like this, who specifically are you going to buy?

00:13:33 Kevin Mako: And why did you choose that product as opposed to my product? So you're getting the, I guess the data-driven answer that you want.

00:13:39 Kevin Mako: And then you're trying to go one step further into

00:13:41 Matt Selbie: getting actual data back that you can analyze that answer and try and figure out if there's a trend

00:13:46 Matt Selbie: based on various users who are, I guess, migrating away from the product for that reason, right? I agree. There's another way of thinking about this as well.

00:13:54 Matt Selbie: I know in the software world and the hardware world, and to a certain extent the services world, when there is a startup or a company

00:14:01 Matt Selbie: that's just trying to make its decision on products more transparent based on data, there is a tendency to want to have feature creep.

00:14:11 Matt Selbie: If only we had handles that are upside down or it's in blue and spots or it plays the star spangled batter, wouldn't it be much better? That's the kiss of death.

00:14:21 Matt Selbie: So one of the ways we try to think about this is to answer two questions about the same attribute.

00:14:29 Matt Selbie: Some people call this, Kevin, vulnerability analysis. Some people call it key driver analysis. Either of the two terms is just fine.

00:14:39 Matt Selbie: So let me give you an example. Remember, you're asking two questions about one facet or one feature.

00:14:46 Matt Selbie: The first question is right now, using a scale of one to five, how well does this product meet X need?

00:14:56 Matt Selbie: I'll say, let's just use color for the sake of this argument. How well does having a red color meet your need? So it's a how well does it do right now?

00:15:05 Matt Selbie: The second question is, how important is color to you in the selection of a

00:15:11 Matt Selbie: product. It's a two-pronged question about the same facet. Now, when you plot this on a two-by-two

00:15:19 Matt Selbie: matrix, on the x-axis is the how well do we do, on the y-axis is how important is it to the customer? Let me give you an example.

00:15:30 Matt Selbie: Is red the right color and we do that really well? That's going to be on the right-hand side.

00:15:36 Matt Selbie: But if red is irrelevant to the customer, that position is going to be at the bottom right. So you're basically producing something and you're doing really well,

00:15:45 Matt Selbie: but it's completely irrelevant to your prospective customer. So this vulnerability work or key

00:15:51 Matt Selbie: driver work is critical for the startup to understand out of an array of feature properties

00:16:00 Matt Selbie: that they think are important. It's a way of sorting them out and then sorting them out on the basis of how well you do them.

00:16:08 Matt Selbie: Because if red isn't unimportant, for a question, Crying out loud, guys, time out here. Pick something that's really important that will make a

00:16:16 Kevin Mako: difference. All we're trying to do in all of this, Kevin, is to come down from the 30 ,000 feet,

00:16:23 Kevin Mako: make real-time decisions based on strategic questions that are product-specific.

00:16:29 Kevin Mako: That's incredibly valuable stuff. You must have listened to some of these podcast episodes

00:16:33 Kevin Mako: because one of the big things that we talk about here is not just feedback, but it's feature creep, especially in hardware. Because hardware is a difficult.

00:16:40 Kevin Mako: space. If you add a feature, that means you are doing a tremendous amount of work to engineer,

00:16:46 Kevin Mako: test, incorporate that into manufacturing, produce the thing, and then serve it via warranty or however you're serving that feature.

00:16:52 Kevin Mako: So a single feature, not only in and itself can be very complicated, but in hardware, it usually has these interactive relationships to other

00:16:59 Kevin Mako: parts of the product, which can also create new problems and pain points. So feature creep becomes something that you need to hyperanalyze. One of the big messages that we put on

00:17:08 Kevin Mako: the show, especially to a new hardware product coming out on the market or even a new innovation, is really to stick to the core innovation and do a really good job of that one or

00:17:17 Kevin Mako: maybe two sets of features. From there, what you're talking about can really help the audience when they're looking

00:17:23 Kevin Mako: at this product or at the time of use to determine maybe these other three, four, five features, first of all, which of them should you do? Which don't matter at all?

00:17:32 Kevin Mako: And if they're on there, what is the actual importance of those individual features? Because that's something that is always very

00:17:38 Kevin Mako: difficult to ascertain, especially as the innovator, you've got all these crazy ideas, brilliant

00:17:42 Kevin Mako: ideas, really, but what's very difficult to ascertain is what is the actual market reaction to these things?

00:17:47 Kevin Mako: Correct. What better way to do it than actually having the market tell you. So you

00:17:51 Kevin Mako: know where to funnel that money, which really is what it comes down to, time and money to add those

00:17:56 Kevin Mako: features in to get them onto where there's your next version of the product or your

00:18:01 Matt Selbie: pro version of that product or possibly even a stripped down version of that product. You're trying to sell the mass retail. All these things factor into that feed.

00:18:08 Matt Selbie: back loop, which is where your advice here could become very helpful. Well, and also it has ramifications around not just product design, which I know we're talking

00:18:15 Matt Selbie: about today, but imagine if you had a product that you thought you could sell based on six advantages, speed, safety, color, handles, whatever it is.

00:18:25 Matt Selbie: Well, now you're talking about a colossal marketing budget to be able to incorporate all of these things, where it's generally, as you know,

00:18:32 Matt Selbie: in the selling of this thing, the messaging of it, you can really only talk about two or three. So one of the benefits of this type of vulnerability review is

00:18:41 Matt Selbie: that it will give you those two or three. One of the exercises that we've done in the past, which is why we prefer vulnerability,

00:18:48 Matt Selbie: that is the two questions about the same facet, rather than incorporating a list and you say, hey, Kevin, these are these five facets, just rank them one, two, three, four, five.

00:18:57 Matt Selbie: That's a really arbitrary process that involves a lot of thinking. Why is it that this is number three where it's so close to number four?

00:19:05 Matt Selbie: And your head sort of slightly explodes with it.

00:19:07 Kevin Mako: We find the vulnerability way a much more important way to distinguish between these different facets that focuses the

00:19:16 Kevin Mako: mind on the right things to focus on. Very useful. And I love how you're mentioning both the product development side and the sales side. Those two generally go hand in hand.

00:19:25 Kevin Mako: That's one of the incredible advantages of focusing on an MVP, very clear, very niche first version of your product. It's not just the eases in developing it, manufacturing.

00:19:35 Kevin Mako: it, refunds, defects, et cetera. I mean, you save a tremendous amount of cost up front, but being able to hone down on that

00:19:41 Kevin Mako: message, which is that what is the one key driver of your product? What's your tagline?

00:19:46 Kevin Mako: What's that major impact statement that really resonates with the hearts of your actual users? Either way, whether it's development or whether it's sales, this is still going to be

00:19:54 Kevin Mako: applicable in both fields. I want to talk a bit about somebody who is launching a new product.

00:19:59 Kevin Mako: You've done a lot of work in exhibition halls where people are showcasing for the first time their product to a general audience.

00:20:06 Kevin Mako: Sometimes it can be more specific if you have certain interest groups coming to your booth. But imagine somebody's launching a product in one way or another, whether it's on

00:20:13 Kevin Mako: Kickstarter, whether it's direct consumer on their website, whether it's at a trade show. What are some tips

00:20:17 Matt Selbie: for hardware companies that you see in addition to what we talked about already that are some either really good

00:20:21 Matt Selbie: questions asked or really good ways to frame their feedback loop or just other tips and tricks to get that good feedback on an initial launch of their new product.

00:20:31 Matt Selbie: One of the things that we find has an enormous impact is if you say to a prospect,

00:20:37 Matt Selbie: whoever comes to the booth or whomever you are requesting of that feedback, is we will give you the results of the feedback that we collect.

00:20:45 Matt Selbie: So I'm basically saying to Kevin, Kevin, I really respect your time giving the feedback here today.

00:20:51 Matt Selbie: We're going to be committing to reviewing the feedback and then we will let you know what happens. One of the reasons that that's important is because now Kevin feels important

00:21:01 Matt Selbie: enough to know that whatever he gives, two minutes, five minutes, whatever that is, it's going to make a

00:21:07 Matt Selbie: difference. So we know that the response rate goes up by at least 10 % when you do that. So first thing

00:21:14 Matt Selbie: I would say is make a commitment to make that at least back to Kevin or more public in general.

00:21:19 Matt Selbie: You don't need to go into the warts and all of it, but that would be the first thing. The second thing is to qualify a person who's giving the feedback.

00:21:26 Matt Selbie: Now, I know that that's something we just talked a little bit about beforehand. There is no point asking my dad, who's 86, to

00:21:34 Matt Selbie: give you feedback about an Xbox controller. Absolutely none whatsoever. So have a number of questions that you can qualify the person, not

00:21:43 Matt Selbie: based upon intent to purchase,

00:21:45 Matt Selbie: but are these the right sort of people that are in your wheelhouse that might purchase at some point? So that would be the second one. So I have a couple of qualifying questions.

00:21:55 Matt Selbie: The third one is to make that feedback short. So let me give you an example. In what's called an out of home point of experience feedback

00:22:05 Matt Selbie: session, which is what we're talking about, an exhibit booth, make sure that the feedback that's been requested lasts no more than two minutes.

00:22:15 Matt Selbie: If it goes beyond two minutes, we find that the quality and the accuracy of the answers diminishes.

00:22:22 Matt Selbie: rapidly because people get bored. How much more is Kevin going to ask me? You've got to be kidding. This question is just like the one I asked earlier.

00:22:30 Matt Selbie: Just keep it short and manageable and tell Kevin up front, hey, Kevin, we want two minutes of your time. A fourth one is to say, okay, so we've

00:22:39 Matt Selbie: talked a little bit about vulnerability analysis. We've spoken a little bit about some of the key things.

00:22:44 Matt Selbie: One of the questions should be particularly end, okay, Kevin, we didn't score five out of five for handle design.

00:22:52 Matt Selbie: What is the one thing we can make this product be to make it part of your future consideration? So again, let me break that down.

00:23:02 Matt Selbie: I'm not asking you for the meaning of life. I'm not asking you for your mother's maiden name or what your dog had for breakfast. I'm asking you for one thing.

00:23:11 Matt Selbie: Why is that important? Because now Kevin only has one thing that's occupying him and it's top of mind.

00:23:18 Kevin Mako: It will be the thing that he's thinking about first, which means he can regurgitate it easier. So when you add those four things together,

00:23:25 Kevin Mako: the feedback session at the exhibit hall or wherever is going to be the most productive and you can get through the most people.

00:23:33 Matt Selbie: Does that all jive? This is incredible that you've broken it down into clear, actionable steps. I have so much appreciate the tactical approach to it.

00:23:42 Matt Selbie: You deal with a lot of this in the service that you offer now. Talk a bit about what you're doing to help people get that real-time data and get it in the right way.

00:23:49 Matt Selbie: Well, I mean, we have a software as a service technology that allows feedback to be delivered at this point of consumption.

00:23:56 Matt Selbie: And the reason that we did it, Kevin, is I'm sure that you're a coffee drinker. Okay. Now, there is no point asking you feedback on

00:24:06 Matt Selbie: the cup of coffee you're drinking now tomorrow. Absolutely none whatsoever. The only feedback that's relevant is what you're experiencing right now.

00:24:14 Matt Selbie: So the feedback software that we have can be used at really any point in what's called the customer journey from whether they're parking their car to eventually buying

00:24:22 Matt Selbie: the product at checkout. But it couldn't be about any part of that journey. Could they find car parking space? Were the people friendly? Could they find the product?

00:24:31 Matt Selbie: What does that product look like on the shelf? And one of the things that I would encourage, I know we've been talking about product feedback.

00:24:38 Matt Selbie: I know we've been talking about product development. But at some point, you have to assume that,

00:24:44 Matt Selbie: the product that is in this laboratory condition that is in your design studio or in a small

00:24:50 Matt Selbie: business garage with kind of cups of noodles hanging over their head with these sweat on their brow developers, you need to understand how that product is going to

00:25:00 Matt Selbie: look in situ. So we can talk about retail, for example. There is a phenomena in retail called camouflage, retail camouflage. So imagine

00:25:09 Matt Selbie: Kevin has developed a beautiful blue widget and it's going to be sitting. in the category of widgets, on the shelf of widgets, at the

00:25:18 Matt Selbie: back end of a store. What you need to do is to also design what you think that product needs to do to stand out

00:25:27 Matt Selbie: amongst the widgets that are there. Otherwise, you're going to get lost. I don't care whether the thing has got, it could have a cake with dancing girls coming out of it.

00:25:35 Matt Selbie: Unless it's seen, all of that stuff will be wasted. So one of the things that we do a lot in retail, exhibits and exhibitions as well, is to get

00:25:44 Matt Selbie: feedback about the way it's situated. Can I see it? What was the most important thing that struck me?

00:25:51 Matt Selbie: What other product that was adjacent got my attention even more? So it's really worth your audience

00:25:58 Matt Selbie: thinking about the situation of the product once it's left the aseptic conditions of the

00:26:05 Matt Selbie: laboratory and design place that you've spent so much time talking about. So don't just get product

00:26:11 Matt Selbie: feedback, but once it's situated, get feedback on the efficiency of its placement. How does your software fit into all this?

00:26:18 Matt Selbie: Well, because we allow that feedback to occur at the point of consideration. So we do quite a lot of work in retail where you've basically got two audiences.

00:26:27 Matt Selbie: You've got a shopper, but you've also got a browser, someone who's walking around the store thinking, I might buy it, I might not buy it.

00:26:36 Matt Selbie: And so what you typically see is signage that's adjacent to the product that invites feedback using the cell phone, whether they text in, call

00:26:45 Matt Selbie: in, QR code in, or go online. And we do it in various languages and then walk that person through a very short, specific list of

00:26:54 Matt Selbie: questions that the product company doesn't know the answer to. So we did one recently with a water company.

00:27:02 Matt Selbie: The very thing that they thought was going to drive sales was inconsequential in the ranked list

00:27:09 Kevin Mako: of things that we found that was important to that buyer in considering what water to bring to the

00:27:15 Matt Selbie: market. And this is particularly important when the product is being introduced, because that's when the vision is the freshest.

00:27:22 Matt Selbie: So that's how we can help in these types of environment. Matt, much appreciated for all your words of wisdom today. I'll also put in the show notes links

00:27:31 Matt Selbie: to your software and your LinkedIn and all that sort of stuff. Thanks again for being on the show. It's been a pleasure talking to you. I hope it's been of some value.

00:27:39 Matt Selbie: and keep putting out the great stuff. Absolutely. Thanks, Matt. Appreciate it. Thanks. Bye now.

00:27:44 Narrator: Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Product Startup Podcast, the show that teaches you what it really takes to bring your product to market

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00:27:59 Narrator: the original and leading firm in North America to provide global caliber in-to-end physical consumer product development to startups, inventors,

00:28:08 Narrator: and small product business clients. If you're looking for product development help on your invention, head over to MakoDesign.com.

00:28:16 Narrator: That's M-A-K-O Design dot com for a free consultation from one of Mako Design's Ford Design Studios from coast to coast.

00:28:25 Narrator: Thanks for listening and see you next time.