How to Gather Unique Customer Insights

Surveys can serve an important purpose. We should use them to fill holes in our understanding of the customer experience or build better models with the customer data we have. As surveys tell you what customers explicitly choose to share, you should not be using them to measure the experience. Surveys are also inherently reactive, surface level, and increasingly ignored by customers who are overwhelmed by feedback requests. This is fact. There’s a different way. Some CX leaders understand that the most critical insights come from sources customers don’t even realize they’re providing from the “exhaust” of every day life with your brand. Real-time digital behavior, social listening, conversational analytics, and predictive modeling deliver insights that surveys alone never will. Voice and sentiment analytics, for example, go beyond simply reading customer comments. They reveal how customers genuinely feel by analyzing tone, frustration, or intent embedded within interactions. Behavioral analytics, meanwhile, uncover friction points by tracking real customer actions across websites or apps, highlighting issues users might never explicitly complain about. Predictive analytics are also becoming essential for modern CX strategies. They anticipate customer needs, allowing businesses to proactively address potential churn, rather than merely reacting after the fact. The capability can also help you maximize revenue in the experiences you are delivering (a use case not discussed often enough). The most forward-looking CX teams today are blending traditional feedback with these deeper, proactive techniques, creating a comprehensive view of their customers. If you’re just beginning to move beyond a survey-only approach, prioritizing these more advanced methods will help ensure your insights are not only deeper but actionable in real time. Surveys aren’t dead (much to my chagrin), but relying solely on them means leaving crucial insights behind. While many enterprises have moved beyond surveys, the majority are still overly reliant on them. And when you get to mid-market or small businesses? The survey slapping gets exponentially worse. Now is the time to start looking beyond the questionnaire and your Likert scales. The email survey is slowly becoming digital dust. And the capabilities to get you there are readily available. How are you evolving your customer listening strategy beyond traditional surveys? #customerexperience #cxstrategy #customerinsights #surveys

Most teams are just wasting their time watching session replays. Why? Because not all session replays are equally valuable, and many don’t uncover the real insights you need. After 15 years of experience, here’s how to find insights that can transform your product: — 𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝗘𝘅𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗰𝘁 𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗹 𝗜𝗻𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁𝘀 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗦𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗥𝗲𝗽𝗹𝗮𝘆𝘀 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗗𝗶𝗹𝗲𝗺𝗺𝗮: Too many teams pick random sessions, watch them from start to finish, and hope for meaningful insights. It’s like searching for a needle in a haystack. The fix? Start with trigger moments — specific user behaviors that reveal critical insights. ➔ The last session before a user churns. ➔ The journey that ended in a support ticket. ➔ The user who refreshed the page multiple times in frustration. Select five sessions with these triggers using powerful tools like @LogRocket. Focusing on a few key sessions will reveal patterns without overwhelming you with data. — 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗧𝗵𝗿𝗲𝗲-𝗣𝗮𝘀𝘀 𝗧𝗲𝗰𝗵𝗻𝗶𝗾𝘂𝗲 Think of it like peeling back layers: each pass reveals more details. 𝗣𝗮𝘀𝘀 𝟭: Watch at double speed to capture the overall flow of the session. ➔ Identify key moments based on time spent and notable actions. ➔ Bookmark moments to explore in the next passes. 𝗣𝗮𝘀𝘀 𝟮: Slow down to normal speed, focusing on cursor movement and pauses. ➔ Observe cursor behavior for signs of hesitation or confusion. ➔ Watch for pauses or retracing steps as indicators of friction. 𝗣𝗮𝘀𝘀 𝟯: Zoom in on the bookmarked moments at half speed. ➔ Catch subtle signals of frustration, like extended hovering or near-miss clicks. ➔ These small moments often hold the key to understanding user pain points. — 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗤𝘂𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗶𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 + 𝗤𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗙𝗿𝗮𝗺𝗲𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸 Metrics show the “what,” session replays help explain the “why.” 𝗦𝘁𝗲𝗽 𝟭: 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗮 Gather essential metrics before diving into sessions. ➔ Focus on conversion rates, time on page, bounce rates, and support ticket volume. ➔ Look for spikes, unusual trends, or issues tied to specific devices. 𝗦𝘁𝗲𝗽 𝟮: 𝗖𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗪𝗮𝘁𝗰𝗵 𝗟𝗶𝘀𝘁𝘀 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗮 Organize sessions based on success and failure metrics: ➔ 𝗦𝘂𝗰𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗖𝗮𝘀𝗲𝘀: Top 10% of conversions, fastest completions, smoothest navigation. ➔ 𝗙𝗮𝗶𝗹𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗖𝗮𝘀𝗲𝘀: Bottom 10% of conversions, abandonment points, error encounters. — 𝗕𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝘀𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗦𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗥𝗲𝗽𝗹𝗮𝘆 𝗣𝗿𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗰𝗲 Make session replays a regular part of your team’s workflow and follow these principles: ➔ Focus on one critical flow at first, then expand. ➔ Keep it routine. Fifteen minutes of focused sessions beats hours of unfocused watching. ➔ Keep rotating the responsibiliy and document everything. — Want to go deeper and get more out of your session replays without wasting time? Check the link in the comments!

While it can be easily believed that customers are the ultimate experts about their own needs, there are ways to gain insights and knowledge that customers may not be aware of or able to articulate directly. While customers are the ultimate source of truth about their needs, product managers can complement this knowledge by employing a combination of research, data analysis, and empathetic understanding to gain a more comprehensive understanding of customer needs and expectations. The goal is not to know more than customers but to use various tools and methods to gain insights that can lead to building better products and delivering exceptional user experiences. ➡️ User Research: Conducting thorough user research, such as interviews, surveys, and observational studies, can reveal underlying needs and pain points that customers may not have fully recognized or articulated. By learning from many users, we gain holistic insights and deeper insights into their motivations and behaviors. ➡️ Data Analysis: Analyzing user data, including behavioral data and usage patterns, can provide valuable insights into customer preferences and pain points. By identifying trends and patterns in the data, product managers can make informed decisions about what features or improvements are most likely to address customer needs effectively. ➡️ Contextual Inquiry: Observing customers in their real-life environment while using the product can uncover valuable insights into their needs and challenges. Contextual inquiry helps product managers understand the context in which customers use the product and how it fits into their daily lives. ➡️ Competitor Analysis: By studying competitors and their products, product managers can identify gaps in the market and potential unmet needs that customers may not even be aware of. Understanding what competitors offer can inspire product improvements and innovation. ➡️ Surfacing Implicit Needs: Sometimes, customers may not be able to express their needs explicitly, but through careful analysis and empathetic understanding, product managers can infer these implicit needs. This requires the ability to interpret feedback, observe behaviors, and understand the context in which customers use the product. ➡️ Iterative Prototyping and Testing: Continuously iterating and testing product prototypes with users allows product managers to gather feedback and refine the product based on real-world usage. Through this iterative process, product managers can uncover deeper customer needs and iteratively improve the product to meet those needs effectively. ➡️ Expertise in the Domain: Product managers, industry thought leaders, academic researchers, and others with deep domain knowledge and expertise can anticipate customer needs based on industry trends, best practices, and a comprehensive understanding of the market. #productinnovation #discovery #productmanagement #productleadership

“If you want to know how to improve—ask the people you serve.” — Unknown Post #19: Engage Customers as Advisors In turbulent markets, customer insight isn’t a nice-to-have—it’s a competitive advantage. While competitors hunker down or rely on stale assumptions, winning CEOs get closer to their customers than ever—and not just as vendors, but as partners. Your customers are your best consultants. They're already living through the same volatility you are. They know what’s changing, what’s no longer working, and what would make you indispensable. When I was preparing to launch a major product expansion in the gaming payments space, we didn’t just build in a vacuum—we brought our customers in early. We identified a group of high-value operators and convened a Customer Advisory Council ahead of the rollout. Their input directly influenced UX design, feature prioritization, and the go-to-market strategy. They told us what they loved. More importantly, they told us what they didn’t. We listened, iterated, and improved. The result? A product that not only performed better at launch—but was already backed by early adopters who felt like co-creators, not end users. Here’s how to turn customers into strategic advisors: + Select a diverse mix of strategic accounts—look for breadth in geography, size, and use case. + Create a recurring feedback cadence—formal advisory boards, listening sessions, 1:1 outreach. + Frame the ask clearly: “We’re navigating change. We’d value your voice in shaping what comes next.” + Act on what you hear—and close the loop. Customers want to feel heard, not surveyed. + Celebrate co-creation wins—when your customers help shape something, they champion it. In uncertain markets, don’t guess what your customers need. Ask them. Invite them into the process. Let them help you build what matters most. Next up: Post #20 – Implement Real-Time KPI Tracking #CEOPlaybook #CustomerAdvisory #VoiceOfTheCustomer #CoCreation #LeadershipInTurbulence

Your Product Managers are talking to customers. So why isn’t your product getting better? A few years ago, I was on a team where our boss had a rule: 🗣️ “Everyone must talk to at least one customer each week.” So we did. Calls were scheduled. Conversations happened. Boxes were checked. But nothing changed. No real insights. No real impact. Because talking to customers isn’t the goal. Learning the right things is. When discovery lacks purpose, it leads to wasted effort, misaligned strategy, and poor business decisions: ❌ Features get built that no one actually needs. ❌ Roadmaps get shaped by the loudest voices, not the right customers. ❌ Teams collect insights… but fail to act on them. How Do You Fix It? ✅ Talk to the Right People Not every customer insight is useful. Prioritize: -> Decision-makers AND end-users – You need both perspectives. -> Customers who represent your core market – Not just the loudest complainers. -> Direct conversations – Avoid proxy insights that create blind spots. 👉 Actionable Step: Before each interview, ask: “Is this customer representative of the next 100 we want to win?” If not, rethink who you’re talking to. ✅ Ask the Right Questions A great question challenges assumptions. A bad one reinforces them. -> Stop asking: “Would you use this?” -> Start asking: “How do you solve this today?” -> Show AI prototypes and iterate in real-time – Faster than long discovery cycles. -> If shipping something is faster than researching it—just build it. 👉 Actionable Step: Replace one of your upcoming interview questions with: “What workarounds have you created to solve this problem?” This reveals real pain points. ✅ Don’t Let Insights Die in a Doc Discovery isn’t about collecting insights. It’s about acting on them. -> Validate across multiple customers before making decisions. -> Share findings with your team—don’t keep them locked in Notion. -> Close the loop—show customers how their feedback shaped the product. 👉 Actionable Step: Every two weeks, review customer insights with your team to decipher key patterns and identify what changes should be applied. If there’s no clear action, you’re just collecting data—not driving change. Final Thought Great discovery doesn’t just inform product decisions—it shapes business strategy. Done right, it helps teams build what matters, align with real customer needs, and drive meaningful outcomes. 👉 Be honest—are your customer conversations actually making a difference? If not, what’s missing? -- 👋 I'm Ron Yang, a product leader and advisor. Follow me for insights on product leadership + strategy.

I often say: Focus on psychographics (values, interests) Over demographics (age, gender, income) The tough part? Gathering psychographics (without being creepy or invasive.) It's easier to rely on demographics. They're: - painless to gather - straightforward - easy to analyze - quantifiable But it's a mistake to depend on them. A costly one. They're a weak data point. The role they play in purchase decisions? Smaller than many marketers think. Psychographics are much more useful. And easier to collect than you think. Here's how I do it: 👉 Customer surveys Ask direct questions about values, interests, and the purchase process. 👉 Social listening Analyze what your audience is saying in comments, reviews, and posts. Look for patterns in their language, pain points, and values. 👉 Website behavior Track which pages customers visit, what content they engage with, and how they navigate your site. 👉 Customer interviews Understand the customer buying process — from the first moment a customer noticed a problem in their life through purchasing your product (and ideally your product solving their problem). 👉 Community engagement Host webinars, engage in online groups, read and respond to customer comments. Learn your target market's pain points and how they phrase those pain points. 👉 Analyze reviews and testimonials Look for recurring themes in what people say about your product — or your competitors'. Psychographics give you: - customer behavior insights - voice-of-customer data - value props - pain points It's priceless info. Use it to hone your messaging, offers, marketing, design, and product. #marketing #customerinsights #strategy

Actual footage of me working on positioning with no customer interviews, call recordings, and muddy crm data 👇 Yes, you can get some market intel/social listening going but it’s hardly enough. Not ideal, but here’s how I did it anyway last month (and it landed well): 1️⃣ Talk to folks in customer-facing teams ↳There is so much internal undocumented knowledge. Handpick folks from sales, customer success, customer support, services, solution engineers, product, if they have a lot of customer facetime. ↳If there are multiple segments, regions or products at play, get representation from all of them. 2️⃣ Ask similar open-ended questions ↳Who - get as much detail as you can about their ICP, preferably without using that term. Examples: -“Who tends to be a ‘good’ customer? And by that I mean high adoption rate, engaged, gets the most value, etc" Be specific, don't let them guess what you meant by 'good' -“When you speak to a prospect / onboard a customer, what tells you they’d be a great fit?” These folks can tell very quickly if someone is likely to buy. But you have to ask. -“Who is typically involved in the sales cycle/solutioning/onboarding?" This is a must for messaging too. ↳Why - ask about the pains/situation ↳How - how are they selling now, what they wish they had. It's useful for messaging but also to clarify how they’re thinking about it. 3️⃣ Ask about distinct capabilities and alternatives ↳The insight you get from them will be way deeper than only relaying on whatever you get from Perplexity. But use both. Form a hypotheis, ask follow up questions. 4️⃣ Dig deeper when trends emerge ↳If you heard the same thing from a few people in different teams/regions, you can start assuming it’s true. ↳Instead of continuing to ask the rest the exact same thing, ask them to confirm what you understood from previous conversations. ✋ If they have a different take they’ll correct you. 👍 If they agree they’ll confirm. Either way, now you can dig deeper. s/o to Jen Allen-Knuth for this trick. She teaches to use it in sales convos but I find it incredibly valuable also in this context. 5️⃣ Get specific ↳Don’t let anyone get away with generic statements. Ask for examples. Recency bias is better than unfounded simplistic claims. 6️⃣ Layer in as much other info as possible ↳Examples: - CRM data, even if aggregated - Competitive intel - Financials (where’s the revenue actually coming from, who are the biggest customers, etc.) ↳It’s useful for 2 things: - Rationalize things you see - Poke holes in what you hear Not easy, but not impossible.

You should definitely make customer research the cornerstone of your B2B go-to-market strategy. The trick is leveraging insights to drive actionable sales and marketing decisions, not just product tweaks. Here are three ways: 1. Conduct regular customer interviews Set up weekly or monthly calls with a diverse set of customers to uncover evolving needs and decision-making processes. A professional services firm I worked with reshaped its entire sales pitch to talk less about itself and more about its ICP's job to be done. The result was a higher close rate. Sometimes, what you think is a strength might be holding you back. 2. Mine your sales calls regularly Implement a system to analyze and categorize key moments from your team's sales conversations that inform your GTM strategy. One of our B2B tech clients discovered that many prospects were using a manual competitive alternative that wasn't even on their radar. You can use these insights to refine your messaging and objection handling. 3. Deploy simple website visitor surveys Place short, targeted surveys on key pages to understand more about visitors, their challenges, and friction points in your conversion funnel. I know of a company that increased demo requests by 40% after learning that potential customers were confused about which product tier was right for them. Customer research isn't just about product development—it's about aligning every touchpoint of your go-to-market motion with what truly matters to your buyers. Pick one of these tactics and implement it this week. Your pipeline (and your bottom line) will thank you.

User research is great, but what if you do not have the time or budget for it........ In an ideal world, you would test and validate every design decision. But, that is not always the reality. Sometimes you do not have the time, access, or budget to run full research studies. So how do you bridge the gap between guessing and making informed decisions? These are some of my favorites: 1️⃣ Analyze drop-off points: Where users abandon a flow tells you a lot. Are they getting stuck on an input field? Hesitating at the payment step? Running into bugs? These patterns reveal key problem areas. 2️⃣ Identify high-friction areas: Where users spend the most time can be good or bad. If a simple action is taking too long, that might signal confusion or inefficiency in the flow. 3️⃣ Watch real user behavior: Tools like Hotjar | by Contentsquare or PostHog let you record user sessions and see how people actually interact with your product. This exposes where users struggle in real time. 4️⃣ Talk to customer support: They hear customer frustrations daily. What are the most common complaints? What issues keep coming up? This feedback is gold for improving UX. 5️⃣ Leverage account managers: They are constantly talking to customers and solving their pain points, often without looping in the product team. Ask them what they are hearing. They will gladly share everything. 6️⃣ Use survey data: A simple Google Forms, Typeform, or Tally survey can collect direct feedback on user experience and pain points. 6️⃣ Reference industry leaders: Look at existing apps or products with similar features to what you are designing. Use them as inspiration to simplify your design decisions. Many foundational patterns have already been solved, there is no need to reinvent the wheel. I have used all of these methods throughout my career, but the trick is knowing when to use each one and when to push for proper user research. This comes with time. That said, not every feature or flow needs research. Some areas of a product are so well understood that testing does not add much value. What unconventional methods have you used to gather user feedback outside of traditional testing? _______ 👋🏻 I’m Wyatt—designer turned founder, building in public & sharing what I learn. Follow for more content like this!

Track customer UX metrics during design to improve business results. Relying only on analytics to guide your design decisions is a missed opportunity to truly understand your customers. Analytics only show what customers did, not why they did it. Tracking customer interactions throughout the product lifecycle helps businesses measure and understand how customers engage with their products before and after launch. The goal is to ensure the design meets customer needs and achieves desired outcomes before building. By dividing the process into three key stages—customer understanding (attitudinal metrics), customer behavior (behavioral metrics), and customer activity (performance metrics)—you get a clearer picture of customer needs and how your design addresses them. → Customer Understanding In the pre-market phase, gathering insights about how well customers get your product’s value guides your design decisions. Attitudinal metrics collected through surveys or interviews help gauge preferences, needs, and expectations. The goal is to understand how potential customers feel about the product concept. → Customer Behavior Tracking how customers interact with prototype screens or products shows whether the design is effective. Behavioral metrics like click-through rates and session times provide insights into how users engage with the design. This phase bridges the pre-market and post-market stages and helps identify any friction points in the design. →  Customer Activity After launch, post-market performance metrics like task completion and error rates measure how customers use the product in real-world scenarios. These insights help determine if the product meets its goals and how well it supports user needs. Designers should take a data-informed approach by collecting and analyzing data at each stage to make sure the product continues evolving to meet customer needs and business goals. #productdesign #productdiscovery #userresearch #uxresearch