The mom test

How Vungle was born from an ad accidentally auto-playing in a meeting

Jack Smith recounts pivoting at AngelPad: after a recorder app blasted a Coke video during an investor meeting, the team realized they could show 15-second video ads for apps inside other apps. Prospective customers immediately offered $5K-$10K ad spend.

“Opened this like sound recorder app and it started like auto-playing on full volume like some video for Coke. Like we're trying to close it, like what the fuck? But then we actually just thought like, hey, wait a minute, what if we had videos like this but like advertising other games and other apps instead of like Coke stuff?”

Start with a Facebook group to find the real problem

Shaan's playbook: when your instinct says there's an opportunity but you don't know the product yet, start a Facebook community. You hang with customers daily, learn the real problems and insider lingo, and build trust and a list to sell into — as Bala did by partnering with the biggest nursing group on Facebook.

“creating a Facebook group is an awesome way to go because then you get to just hang out with your customers every single day. You get to find out what the real problems are. And when you do have a product ready, you've built up a reputation and trust and a list of people to sell into.”

Steal thisBefore building, start a niche Facebook group to learn the real problem and earn a warm launch list.

Six customer calls is enough to see the pattern

Shaan relays Twitch CEO Emmett Shear's rule for customer interviews: by the sixth conversation you hear the same things over and over, so you can predict answers before they're said and don't need 50 calls. Sam adds that even at scale, calling about 10 users reveals the pattern.

“go talk to people. By the 6th conversation, you'll hear the same thing over and over again. It takes 6 phone calls basically to figure out the pattern. And by the, by the 6th one, you'll know.”

Steal thisRun customer interviews until you can predict the answers; that usually takes about six conversations, not fifty.

The three-question customer interview that built Twitch

Shaan shares Emmett Shear's entire customer-interview method while pivoting Justin.tv to Twitch: ask what they like about their current platform, what they dislike, and what it would take to switch. Then build exactly that, return in two weeks, and ask if they're ready.

“I asked 3 questions. I said, what do you like about your current platform? What do you dislike about your current platform? And what will it take to get you to switch to Twitch? And that's what he asked every single customer.”

Steal thisInterview customers with three questions: what they like, what they dislike, and what it takes to switch; then build that and circle back.

Off-grid mom spent $30/mo on kerosene for a single nightlight

A new mother Helgesen interviewed was spending about $30 a month on kerosene just to fuel one nightlight oil lamp — power a $5, book-sized solar panel could replace at 10x the brightness for the same monthly cost.

“She was spending probably $30 a month on kerosene, which is jet fuel, just to fuel this little oil lamp. And like with a 5-watt solar panel, 5 watts is so tiny. It's like the size of a hardcover book. You can generate enough power to light that house 10 times brighter than what she was getting from that, from that oil lamp.”

Validate demand by taking a real credit card on the spot

Instead of asking whether people liked the idea, the founders pulled up Square and charged real money the moment someone said they'd sign up. They hit ~70 paying accounts before they'd built anything, proving demand was real rather than polite.

“And he was like, well, I have Square on my phone. I can just take a credit card right now. Yeah. Let's see if this is real or if this is Polite. Exactly right. And so I think we got to like 70 accounts and then we're like, holy moly, now we actually have to ship something.”

Steal thisTest demand by charging real money immediately — pull up a card reader and take the payment before you build the product, to separate real intent from politeness.

List every way you'll fail before writing a line of code

A Keith Rabois heuristic Ali adopted: before starting, write a prioritized list of every reason your company could fail and try to disprove each one up front — not after you've built and launched the product.

“One thing I heard Keith Rabois say once is when you start a company, you should think about all of the reasons that it's not going to work and all of the reasons that it's going to fail. And you should start with that list, make a prioritized list, and try to prove that these aren't things that are going to make your company fail. And you want to do that as the first thing.”

Steal thisWrite a pre-mortem memo listing every reason your idea could fail, then try to disprove each one before you build anything.