What is your best way to deal with the market and approach customers? The book “Talking to Humans” by Giff Constable explains how it makes a difference in your business.

We often fail as entrepreneurs and do not understand that the main mistakes that stop us from growth can be summarized in outsourcing services and ignorance about our own market.

Get here the top entrepreneurship tips and learn how to ensure the greatest chances of success for your sales.

The book “Talking to Humans”

The work “Talking to Humans”, by Giff Constable, was published in 2014 and presents the biggest secrets of a successful entrepreneur.

The book is a great guide for those who want to broaden their market knowledge and ask their questions about how to create successful startups with the best ideas and generate the best products.

Who is Giff Constable?

Giff Constable is a CEO, consultant, investment leader, and writer.

He is currently a director of Meetup and is responsible for lectures and courses in the field of entrepreneurship that give fundamental tips on how to evaluate your own ideas and recruit the best clients.

Why should I read “Talking to Humans”?

This work is suitable for entrepreneurs and startup leaders who want to learn how to grow their business, recruit customers and be closer to the top of the ladder of success.

What can I learn from “Talking to Humans”?

Buying, observing and talking are the three pillars for customer identification;
The good entrepreneur needs to know the market of which the business is;
Initial consumers are usually people with some intense problem;
In a classic sale there can be three types of buyers: strategic, economic and technical;
A fluid conversation depends on open questions;
To get a good candidate for conversation, you need to keep in mind three things: Degree of Separation, Creativity, and Direction;
The ways of approach reflect in the choice of clients;
Market research is a good indicator of standards.

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Understanding the Art of Recruiting Customers

The book “Talking to Humans” starts saying that the concept of an entrepreneur is entirely related to creativity. It is synonymous with innovation and always being able to look for something different from what you already have in the market.

But other techniques are required for those who really want to be a successful entrepreneur, being one of them the ability to learn to identify potential customers and to approach people.

This is even a difficulty cited by professionals for various reasons, whether due to some discomfort in interaction, shyness, or even not being sufficiently prepared in the approach, thus, causing insecurity on the part of the entrepreneur.

The book is based on two pillars in which explains two possibilities for an excellent identification and interaction of potential customers. They are:

Direct dialogue and behavior observation;
Creation of situations or experiments in which people themselves express their opinion about that product or service.

However, first of all, you need to know the product you are marketing for. For this, the first step is to put yourself in the consumer’s shoes.

You, as an entrepreneur and current consumer of your own product, need to understand how your business reputation is doing. The surveys are entirely valid.

According to Giff Constable, observing websites about the market you’re in, competitor analysis, and peer-to-peer observations are great tips for putting yourself in the shoes of the customer.

A second point is an observation that aims to analyze people’s behavior: understanding the motivation of purchase, and also perceiving the difficulties of access to the product. So, basically to know about the use and, mainly, what motivated the doubt.

Understand that these are issues that should be taken into consideration, because from them you will be adapting your product in the market, satisfying customers and standing out against the competition.

The third step is to dialogue with the customer. This is the main mechanism to know the market: asking open-ended questions that leave you free to give your opinion is an excellent one.

It is very important to analyze possible criticisms and understand the needs by analyzing groups and the age range of each consumer.

That makes all the difference.

An effective dialogue

Here the book “Talking to Humans” addresses the topic of qualitative research. They can be understood as investigative methods for the recruitment of subjective information and individual opinions.

These surveys, in turn, need to make use of the dialogue between researcher and consumer. For this contact to be effective, precautionary measures, directed and initially studied need to be performed.

Being prepared for questions enables greater comfort, better identification and a more fluid conversation with the customer.

In this analysis, you also need to be aware of the partners who will be responsible for distribution, execution and other parts of the business.

In Giff Constable view, for better identification, especially if you are creating a new product, it is important to understand the specificity of the customer.

It is important to be aware of the types of consumers. Many consumers’ regular decisions depend on the choices of preview consumers. Since the initials are usually people who have a problem to solve and need immediate intervention by the product or service offered.

This is a great time to publicize, recruit specific clients and broaden the featured work.

The author highlights the importance of being aware of the types of consumers that are in companies. Here’s the need to study about the product, the approach, and the organization by which you want to consume that service.

As a good client recruiting and work organization strategy, Giff Constable explains that using an interview guide is a good choice.

The form of distribution depends on the interviewer, but it may be more advantageous to start with those questions that require urgent clarification. Another tip is to be aware of the possible risks, problems, and anxieties exposed by the consumer.

When analyzing your questionnaire pay attention to some points that may help or disturb your interview:

Pay attention to the stories told;
Ask open-ended questions that motivate consumer participation;
Pay attention to questions regarding the price of your product;
Look for feedback on what you offer.

A successful approach

Often, fear creates space in the minds of entrepreneurs and sets a block on the necessary contact with the consumer. Talking to strangers is a constant cause of concern in this environment.

A good way to end, or at least lessen, this insecurity is to study the market and the consumers.

Understand that if the product offered or the subject matter explained is of interest to the prospective buyer, the dialogue will flow in a way that will benefit both.

According to Giff Constable, to have a good selection of candidates you must first use three general rules:

Maintain a degree of separation;
Be creative;
Guide.

The interviewee cannot have any relationship with the interviewer because the answers of family or friends are influenced by who actually presents the problem.

Creativity helps in the social bond at this time. The environments in which people are inserted at the time of approach, the method chosen, the speech, the questions, the focus, all these make all the difference in database analysis.

A great idea is that you create links that lead you to the hard-to-reach professional.

Guiding is related to the approach method.

If your public access route isn't bringing good feedback, change your tactic. So, study the best ways to reach your audience.

The book “Talking to Humans” points out that online questionnaires are an excellent customer access tool and an excellent method of approaching people.

The Positive Interview Method

For an interview to be fluid, Giff draws attention to some essential criteria, being the best approach face to face.

Speaking in person enables better interaction with the client, it is much easier to develop a link and the opportunity for body language identification is more visible and frequent.

At the time of conversation, it is important to give preference to individual conversations. It has been seen that groups of people are an influential source of decision making.

Understand that interaction with the customer or potential buyer needs to be humane. Empathy with others strengthens relationships.

The gratitude to the attention and the time devoted to listening are attitudes that favor the development of the speech.

It is important for you to escape from robotization. People like to hear self-confident and self-assured entrepreneurs.

The act of demonstrating an understanding of the subject, creativity, skills, and speech, are qualities that demonstrate a more interesting and easy way to capture speech.

Also, at the time of the meeting keep in mind a plausible and creative solution that really solves the consumer problem.

Understand that when a consumer seeks problem-solving, he/she has already sought other, more common ways. To complete sales act, it is essential to go through the entire process. And this process also includes listening.

In this process also be aware of filtering the information. What they say is not always what they really do.

Talking to people is the primary method, but using gimmicks is prudent and aids in the process of strategy and decision making.

Planned qualitative research is an excellent preparation mechanism and a great method that drastically reduces the risks and failures that a new entrepreneur will have.

Books about customer service and entrepreneurship

In the book of Flávio Augusto, “Geração de Valor”, it’s explained how, instead of just working for capital, it is also important to generate value for customers. Creating value in other people's lives will create value for you.

In the book “The Lean Startup”, the author Eric Ries says that a startup’s true productivity is measured by the systematic search for the right things to do. In a Lean startup, every product, every feature and every advertising campaign is understood as an experiment to achieve validated learning.

In “Mude ou Morra”, Renato Mendes and Roni Bueno explain how to make your business thrive in the New Economy, bringing the customer to the start of the process and understanding that mistakes are part of growth.

How can I apply the ideas from “Talking to Humans”?

Study the competition;
Recruiting consumers is your job. Be a good entrepreneur;
Be a good explorer, but above all be a good listener. Listen to your customers;
Search engines, because optimization requires communication. Stay tuned;
For a successful approach be prepared. Build your interview guide;
Use creativity in your activities;
To enter the market you need to understand it. Inquire;
During the interview, ask open-ended questions that help you share ideas. Make the conversation easier;
Listen to people and filter ideas;

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Talking to Humans - Giff Constable

Do you want to succeed with your venture? Learn once and for all the best way to listen to your customers, conduct market research and target your product!