A STARTUP EXPERIMENTING IN EARNEST GATHERS PROMPT QUALITATIVE FEEDBACK FROM EARLY CUSTOMERS UNLIKE THE TRADITIONAL MARKET RESEARCH.

It is advisable for a Startup venture to get its project off immediately, as an experiment and in a small way.

The experiment determines whether the product or service actually delivers value to the customers using it. It answers the following questions: what indicators point to the fact that customers find it valuable to use the product? What evidence in real time, mirrors the value derived by customers from using the product? What is the number of repeat customers? A customer validates through the worth of a product by investing his or her time, attention and money in the product.

Diligently, the experiment also tests the business plan growth hypothesis. If the growth hypothesis is centred on early adopters or users spreading the word about the product to other customers, then it becomes pertinent to measure behaviour connected to the willingness of the early adopters to recruit other customers.

If a large percentage of the early adopters or users opt out of using the product again, a significant negative result pointing to a faulty strategy is laid out. A negative result suggests that it is time to get some qualitative feedback on how to improve the product, not the time to quit. This feedback is provided by a cohort of people, the early adopters or users. This is unlike the conventional market research that squanders time and resources, interviewing people who have not used the product and who do not know what they really want.