One of the best parts of my job is the opportunity to talk to small business owners. People who are passionate about building a business that sees a creative itch come to life. My product is focused on meeting users where they are both in their journey of business growth and physically in the micro-moments of the day. 

It's pretty easy for me to talk to customers - happy ones and not so happy ones providing feedback via our Customer Solutions Team, NPS, or cancellation surveys. 

But easy is not where the new problems are, where the business growth can be found.

To be successful in Product, is to be curious. Now, before you pellet me with accusation of Product Heresy on Twitter, it's really important to talk to customers. Speaking to the ones that you have now will help ensure your product is solving the problems they came to you to solve in the first place. 

It just shouldn't be the only piece of feedback you seek or leverage. If you keep building for only the users you have, you'll slowly build a solution that fits a more and more specific group of people. Growth will slow. Competitors will start passing you by.

GO FIND NEW PEOPLE. I'm doing this in any way I can. I have a good idea of the persona that I'm building solutions for and now I'm finding all the places they are - conferences, networking groups, co-working spaces, friends at a party (no life-of-the-party jokes from me, only tons of questions about your business 😉). I hear entrepreneur and my ears perk up.

Not only has this been the most fun I've had (ok maybe a little hyperbolic), but I'm finding wide-ranging problems that we can solve, almost today, that we didn't really hear about from current customers. And that, friends, is really exciting!

How do you find not-yet-customers to talk to? What kinds of questions do you ask?