Episode 47: On Using a Discovery Coach with Teresa Torres of Product Discovery Coach
In this week’s episode of Subscriptions: Scaled, we discuss discovery with Product Discovery Coach Teresa Torres.
Teresa works as a product discovery coach. This means she helps product teams make better decisions about what to build to create value for customers and businesses.
Please keep reading to learn all about product discovery coaching, including its benefits and how it works.
Teresa Torres
This episode begins with Teresa explaining her background and how she got into her product discovery coach role.
Teresa Torres is an internationally acclaimed author, speaker, and coach. She teaches a sustainable and structured method to discovery that helps product developers and teams make effective product decisions with customer input.
She has taught hundreds of teams at brands of all sizes. These companies include early-stage start-ups and small businesses to global enterprises across various industries.
Teresa has taught over 7,000 product discovery skills via the Product Talk Academy. She’s also the author of the book Continuous Discovery Habits and blogs at ProductTalk.org.
She got into product discovery coaching early in her career. Teresa first started as a designer and a front-end developer. In time, she moved into product management and then into startup executive leadership roles.
In the leadership roles, Teresa noticed the same problem everywhere. That is, most product teams weren’t spending enough time with their customers. From then, Teresa decided she wanted to work on that problem.
Teresa has been working as a product discovery coach for the last ten years.
Continuous Discovery Habits: Discover Products that Create Customer Value and Business Value
Teresa talks in-depth about her book on discovery, Continuous Discovery Habits: Discover Products that Create Customer Value and Business Value.
The book was published in May 2021. Teresa started it because people were asking her to write a book on her experience as a product discovery coach.
Her aim in writing the book was to get teams to engage with customers and build better products and services, as we all need better products in our lives.
Teresa has been blogging for ten years, so penning a book on her experience felt like the next natural step.
In the episode, Teresa discusses writing and publishing her book during the pandemic. She shares that in her case, the pandemic was a blessing in disguise because she had more time to spend on the book. She took advantage of the time spent at home and did a fair amount of writing.
The response to Continuous Discovery Habits has been incredible. Sales have been high and the reviews have been fantastic.
Teresa shares that she used the same process she teaches for product discovery to test the content in her book. She thought about how she could get feedback on her content. That’s when Teresa started codifying what she taught in an online curriculum used by her coaching clients.
This meant Teresa spent almost three years experimenting and testing her content to create a valuable product for customers.
The Early Reader’s Program
Throughout 2020, while Teresa was still writing the book, she launched her early readers’ program. This consisted of 60 people who paid to receive a chapter each month as Teresa wrote it. They then participated in monthly calls where they provided feedback on the chapters.
Teresa believes the early readers’ program had a huge impact on the book. Many chapters include sections that came from feedback from these early readers to create an actionable and useful book.
The Discovery Process
Throughout the episode, Teresa explains why hiring a discovery coach is so valuable for businesses planning to build a new product. She talks about collaboration in teams and the challenges different opinions can create. She also speaks about the importance of helping customers figure out what they want from a product.
Teresa explains that in many cases, customers don’t realize what’s possible with technology. And it’s the product team’s role to show people what is possible.
When Teresa refers to engaging with customers and getting feedback, product developers need to learn about their lives instead of asking them what they should build.
Product teams should ask some of the following questions:
What are your goals?
What are you trying to achieve?
How does our software fit in your world?
What are the outcomes you’re looking for?
When learning about their customers, product developers need to understand how they can serve their customers and improve their lives. They need to know the context. Before developing a product, it’s essential to get a richer understanding of the people you’re designing for.
Presenting Solutions
Teresa explains that one of the biggest mistakes teams make is putting their solution in front of a customer and asking, ‘Do you want this?’ In most cases, customers don’t know what they want.
It’s easy for someone to say that they want a gym membership, for example. Humans are optimistic about their future behavior and how much time they will have to spend.
Teresa explains that when it comes to solutions, it’s not about asking customers if they want a product. It’s about looking for specific behaviors.
This could involve putting a prototype in front of a potential customer and looking for a specific type of response. Is the individual exhibiting the behavior you want for this particular solution to work?
Product Testing
Teresa also discusses the process of testing products and subscriptions before they are available for purchase.
She explains that when most people hear about testing, they think of AB or split tests. During these tests, developers build a product, launch it in their production environment, and then give a percentage of their audience one version and the other ratio a different version to compare results.
However, Teresa calls this validation research rather than discovery research.
Teresa talks about assumption tests. With these tests, it’s possible to collect data about an assumption within a day or two.
Assumption tests allow developers to test assumptions across multiple ideas and then compare and contrast. If developers take rapid assumption tests across different concepts, they can make better decisions instead of falling prey to confirmation bias.
Teresa wraps up the episode by sharing how she helps businesses slow down instead of jumping ahead and making quick decisions.
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