60 prompts to build customer empathy

Hi, I’m James. Thanks for checking out Building Momentum: a newsletter to help startup founders and marketers accelerate SaaS growth through product marketing.

One of my favorite exercises to do with cross-functional teams – especially where there’s a mix of C-level execs, middle managers, and ICs – is the customer empathy challenge.

We get a group of people together, and each completes a customer empathy map. This is a tool from the product/UX world, designed to help understand your customer.

Align teams with the empathy map challenge

In our world, we’re using it to extract assumptions – what do we believe is true about our customers?

Now, it might seem like a simple enough question.

Initially, people often complain. “I don’t know why we’re doing this, why are we wasting time?”

Then, they give in and admit: “This is actually really hard. I don’t know enough.”

The resulting conversations are actually pretty fun to facilitate!

In every session, it turns out that that:

  • Not everyone knows who the customer is
  • Not everyone agrees who the customer is
  • Those that do, have only a superficial understanding based on how the customer uses the product
  • A few on the frontline of sales and success will know more, but their understanding is narrow in scope

This exercise shines a light on the dark spots, regardless of the whether the company has a customer-centric culture or not.

In most companies, the concept of ‘a customer’ starts and ends solely with the product. How they use it, how they’ll buy it, how we can draw them in.

But they fail to really understand their customer and the market they sell to. They don’t understand how their product fits into their customer’s lives.

How are we meant to position effectively, if we don’t understand the breadth of our customer’s existence?

How are we support to meaningfully differentiate if we don’t understand their world?

How are we supposed to make our customers care about us, if we don’t understand why they should care about us?

Customer empathy map prompts

The customer empathy map is made up of six sections.

Below, you’ll find 60 prompts – 5 per section – to help you explore your understanding of the customer.

Pre-order the physical cards now!

I’m turning these prompts into a pack of physical flashcards that you can use to facilitate workshops, test your knowledge, have fun while thinking about your customer, and find inspiration.

Pre-order Building Customer Empathy flashcards

Limited availability. These will ship in around 3 months, and you’ll be involved in the progress from design to print. No-quibble refunds. Discounts available for multiple purchases: get in touch by Twitter, LinkedIn or email (jdp[@]buildingmomentum.io) to find out more!

Think & Feel

  • What do they think about the company?
  • What do they like or dislike about their role?
  • Why do they stay at the company?
  • What keeps them up at night?
  • What inspires them about the industry they’re in?
  • What do they think about the company strategy?
  • What do they think their biggest challenges are?
  • What do they think their biggest opportunities are?
  • What do they think of your product?
  • What do they think about your competitors?

Say & Do

  1. What does their job require them to do?
  2. How do they achieve their goals?
  3. What do they do that might be outside of their role?
  4. What do they say to their boss?
  5. What do they say to their peers?
  6. What do they say to their family and friends about the job?
  7. What tools and products do they use?
  8. What best practices are they following?
  9. What would they say about your product?
  10. What would they say about their problems?

Hear

  1. What do they hear from their boss?
  2. What do they hear from their peers?
  3. What do they hear from their direct reports?
  4. What do they hear from industry analysts?
  5. What do they hear your company saying?
  6. What do they hear about your company?
  7. What do they hear about your competitors?
  8. What do they hear their customers asking for?
  9. What complaints do they hear from people in their business?
  10. What do they hear from governments/regulators that could present opportunities or threats?
  11. What good news and compliments do they hear from people in their business?

See

  1. What do they see people in their business doing?
  2. What do they see their competitors doing?
  3. What do they see in industry news?
  4. What do they see on social media?
  5. What do they see in news/social media about your competitors?
  6. What do they see in news/social media about your product and company?
  7. What do they see industry leaders doing?
  8. What do they see companies in other industries doing that inspires them?
  9. What do they see their peers in other companies doing?
  10. What do they see your company doing?
  11. What do they see your competitors doing?

Pain (frustrations to avoid)

  1. What stresses them out?
  2. What do they hate about their job?
  3. Why might they get fired?
  4. Why might they leave the company?
  5. What risks would be catastrophic for their business?
  6. What is their executive team warning against in every all-hands?
  7. What are the biggest threats the business is facing?
  8. What’s the biggest threat the individual is facing in their career?
  9. Why might the company fail?
  10. What has caused their competitors to struggle?

Gains (selfish desires)

  1. If they had a magic wand that could solve anything, what would it do?
  2. What does solving their problem unlock?
  3. What will get them a promotion?
  4. What metrics would show the company is doing well?
  5. What means they have succeeded at their job?
  6. What does success mean for the company?
  7. What would mean the company is an industry leader?
  8. What does goal achievement unlock for the individual?
  9. What does goal achievement unlock for the company?
  10. What would make them proud of achieving?

To make customers care about you, first you need to understand them

A narrow working knowledge of your customer and their relationship with your product is not enough to build real customer empathy, deliver customer-centric outcomes, or help you build/position/market/sell effectively.

Using the customer empathy map challenge and these prompts will help you explore your current assumptions so you can align, agree, measure confidence, and discover where you need to carry out additional research to explore the known-unknowns.

Thanks for reading! Let me know what you thought – find me on Twitter and LinkedIn.

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