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Jul 25, 2019 · 31m · y-combinator

Eric Migicovsky - How to Talk to Users · Y Combinator

Eric Migicovsky · 28m spoken
0:00 / 0:00
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In this Y Combinator Startup School lecture, YC partner Eric Migicovsky provides actionable strategies and frameworks for founders to conduct effective user interviews across every stage of startup growth. He emphasizes direct founder involvement, avoiding common interview pitfalls, asking targeted historical questions, and quantitatively evaluating feedback to achieve product-market fit.

How this conversation actually went

Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. How this is scored →

The partners as informed peer 0.0 Guest teaching 0.0 Guest disagreement 0.0 The partners pushing back 0.0
05100:0010:0020:0030:002:33–5:55 · The partners as informed peer 0/10 The Mom Test and Three Common User Interview Mistakes Solo lecture format. Eric outlines the three core mistakes founders make when interviewing users according to The Mom Test without any host interaction.5:55–14:11 · The partners as informed peer 0/10 Five Core Questions for Effective User Interviews Eric presents the five core questions for user interviews using Dropbox as a case study. There is no host involvement or dialogue friction.14:11–19:30 · The partners as informed peer 0/10 Strategies and Tactics for the Idea Stage Eric walks through practical tactics for talking to users at the idea stage, citing Pebble and a firefighter startup. Monologue presentation throughout.19:30–25:22 · The partners as informed peer 0/10 Prototype Stage and Identifying the Ideal First Customer Eric details the Venn diagram framework for scoring potential early customers (cost, frequency, budget) with a smoothie blender hypothetical.25:22–30:55 · The partners as informed peer 0/10 Launched Stage and Iterating Toward Product-Market Fit Eric explains the Superhuman PMF engine, phone number hacks, and ignoring fluffy compliments. The talk concludes with no host pushback.2:33–5:55 · Guest teaching 0/10 The Mom Test and Three Common User Interview Mistakes Solo lecture format. Eric outlines the three core mistakes founders make when interviewing users according to The Mom Test without any host interaction.5:55–14:11 · Guest teaching 0/10 Five Core Questions for Effective User Interviews Eric presents the five core questions for user interviews using Dropbox as a case study. There is no host involvement or dialogue friction.14:11–19:30 · Guest teaching 0/10 Strategies and Tactics for the Idea Stage Eric walks through practical tactics for talking to users at the idea stage, citing Pebble and a firefighter startup. Monologue presentation throughout.19:30–25:22 · Guest teaching 0/10 Prototype Stage and Identifying the Ideal First Customer Eric details the Venn diagram framework for scoring potential early customers (cost, frequency, budget) with a smoothie blender hypothetical.25:22–30:55 · Guest teaching 0/10 Launched Stage and Iterating Toward Product-Market Fit Eric explains the Superhuman PMF engine, phone number hacks, and ignoring fluffy compliments. The talk concludes with no host pushback.2:33–5:55 · Guest disagreement 0/10 The Mom Test and Three Common User Interview Mistakes Solo lecture format. Eric outlines the three core mistakes founders make when interviewing users according to The Mom Test without any host interaction.5:55–14:11 · Guest disagreement 0/10 Five Core Questions for Effective User Interviews Eric presents the five core questions for user interviews using Dropbox as a case study. There is no host involvement or dialogue friction.14:11–19:30 · Guest disagreement 0/10 Strategies and Tactics for the Idea Stage Eric walks through practical tactics for talking to users at the idea stage, citing Pebble and a firefighter startup. Monologue presentation throughout.19:30–25:22 · Guest disagreement 0/10 Prototype Stage and Identifying the Ideal First Customer Eric details the Venn diagram framework for scoring potential early customers (cost, frequency, budget) with a smoothie blender hypothetical.25:22–30:55 · Guest disagreement 0/10 Launched Stage and Iterating Toward Product-Market Fit Eric explains the Superhuman PMF engine, phone number hacks, and ignoring fluffy compliments. The talk concludes with no host pushback.2:33–5:55 · The partners pushing back 0/10 The Mom Test and Three Common User Interview Mistakes Solo lecture format. Eric outlines the three core mistakes founders make when interviewing users according to The Mom Test without any host interaction.5:55–14:11 · The partners pushing back 0/10 Five Core Questions for Effective User Interviews Eric presents the five core questions for user interviews using Dropbox as a case study. There is no host involvement or dialogue friction.14:11–19:30 · The partners pushing back 0/10 Strategies and Tactics for the Idea Stage Eric walks through practical tactics for talking to users at the idea stage, citing Pebble and a firefighter startup. Monologue presentation throughout.19:30–25:22 · The partners pushing back 0/10 Prototype Stage and Identifying the Ideal First Customer Eric details the Venn diagram framework for scoring potential early customers (cost, frequency, budget) with a smoothie blender hypothetical.25:22–30:55 · The partners pushing back 0/10 Launched Stage and Iterating Toward Product-Market Fit Eric explains the Superhuman PMF engine, phone number hacks, and ignoring fluffy compliments. The talk concludes with no host pushback.

speaking balance: gold is the partners, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)

0:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%0:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%3:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%3:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%6:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%6:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%9:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%9:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%12:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%12:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%15:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%15:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%18:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%18:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%21:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%21:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%24:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%24:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%27:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%27:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%30:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%30:00 · the partners 0% · guest 100%
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 29:40 Discarding compliments and fluff

Eric vigorously critiques taking compliments or hypothetical feedback during user interviews, branding them as useless bad data.

 Hardest push from the partners ▶ 31:00 Event wrap-up

In a solo lecture with no interlocutor pushback, the event host simply concludes the presentation.

 Biggest teaching moment ▶ 25:30 Critique of vague PMF definitions

Eric educates the audience on why conventional product-market fit definitions by Paul Graham and Marc Andreessen are retroactive lagging indicators.

 The partners hold their own ▶ 31:00 Session conclusion

No host participation exists during the presentation to demonstrate counter-expertise.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
ChapterTopicThe partners as informed peerGuest teachingGuest disagreementThe partners pushing backWhy
The Mom Test and Three Common User Interview Mistakes 0000 Solo lecture format. Eric outlines the three core mistakes founders make when interviewing users according to The Mom Test without any host interaction.
Five Core Questions for Effective User Interviews 0000 Eric presents the five core questions for user interviews using Dropbox as a case study. There is no host involvement or dialogue friction.
Strategies and Tactics for the Idea Stage 0000 Eric walks through practical tactics for talking to users at the idea stage, citing Pebble and a firefighter startup. Monologue presentation throughout.
Prototype Stage and Identifying the Ideal First Customer 0000 Eric details the Venn diagram framework for scoring potential early customers (cost, frequency, budget) with a smoothie blender hypothetical.
Launched Stage and Iterating Toward Product-Market Fit 0000 Eric explains the Superhuman PMF engine, phone number hacks, and ignoring fluffy compliments. The talk concludes with no host pushback.

Statements from this episode (8)

Insight
Migicovsky: Starting a company requires only building product and talking to users
“At the core of kind of YC's teachings, there are only two things that you must do in order to start your company. You need to code or build your product and talk to users.”
Eric Migicovsky Jul 25, 2019 ▶ 2:02
Insight
Migicovsky: User interviews must extract data, not pitch or sell
“The goal of a great user interview is to extract information from the person that you're talking to extract data that will help you improve the product, or improve your marketing, or improve your positioning. It is not to sell them on using your product.”
Eric Migicovsky Jul 25, 2019 ▶ 3:38
Insight
Migicovsky: Asking users hypothetical feature questions yields bad data
“Second mistake that we pretty much all make is we talk about hypotheticals. We talk about what our product could be. We talk about features that we want to build. We ask questions like we ask questions like, if we built this Feature. Would you be interested in…”
Eric Migicovsky Jul 25, 2019 ▶ 4:08
Insight
Migicovsky: Customers Not Seeking Solutions Won't Care About New Products
“If customers, if potential customers are not already exploring potential solutions to their problem, it's possible that the problem that you're trying to solve is not a burning enough problem for customers for them to be even interested in your better solution…”
Eric Migicovsky Jul 25, 2019 ▶ 11:20
Disclosure
Eric Migicovsky pitched Pebble at CES in coffee shops without a booth
“I remember that when I was working on Pebble we actually went to CES, which is this large consumer electronics show in Vegas. We didn't have a booth. We just went in gorilla style. We just like randomly started setting up in setting up meetings with potential …”
Eric Migicovsky Jul 25, 2019 ▶ 17:35
Insight
Graham and Andreessen's product-market fit definitions are lagging indicators
“Paul Graham's definition for product market fit is when you've made something that people want. Marc Andreessen also has an amazing blog post about product market fit where he describes it as when the product is just being pulled out of you, when you no longer…”
Eric Migicovsky Jul 25, 2019 ▶ 25:33
Insight
Migicovsky: Ask for user phone numbers at signup to clarify data anomalies
“Ask your users for the phone number during signup. Because oftentimes you'll be looking at the data and you'll be wondering, you know, why did, why is the data showing this particular Kind of learning about our customers. And you may be like thinking in aggreg…”
Eric Migicovsky Jul 25, 2019 ▶ 28:29
Insight
Migicovsky: Compliments are the worst feedback because they lack actionable specifics
“Some of the kind of worst bad data that you may encounter is compliments. People may say, oh, I love the new design, or man, this thing is really useful. You may love that during the course of your user interviews, but they actually are not useful information …”
Eric Migicovsky Jul 25, 2019 ▶ 29:57
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