Everyone Lies to You: How to Get the Truth in Customer Interviews [Template Included]
People Don't Want to Hurt Your Feelings
In 2008, Drew Houston was pitching Dropbox to early users. He’d show a demo, and people would nod enthusiastically.
"Yeah, I’d totally use this."
But when he followed up, almost none of them signed up.
Why? Because people don’t like to be mean. They tell you what you want to hear, not what they actually think.
This is the startup founder’s curse. You ask customers if your idea is useful, and they lie to you—out of politeness, optimism, or just not wanting to think too hard.
So how do you get to the truth?
The Framework: How to Get Honest Customer Feedback
Most founders make two mistakes:
They ask about the future. “Would you use this?” People are bad at predicting their own behavior.
They ask for opinions. “What do you think?” Everyone has an opinion, but only actions matter.
Instead, you need to structure discovery interviews to uncover:
✔️ Past behavior (what they’ve already done, not what they might do)
✔️ Real problems (what they already struggle with, not hypotheticals)
✔️ Problem ranking (because not all problems are urgent enough to solve)
The Interview Structure
Use this four-part script to guide your conversations:
1. Build Rapport (5 min)
Start casually. Get them comfortable. The goal is to get them talking about their work or life, not your idea.
“Tell me about your role and day-to-day work.”
“What tools/processes do you use regularly?”
2. Identify Pain (10 min)
Dig into the actual problems they face. The trick is to get specific.
“What’s the most frustrating part of doing X?”
“Tell me about the last time this happened.” (If they can’t recall a time, it’s not a real problem.)
“How do you solve this today?”
3. Rank the Problems (5-10 min)
This is where most founders unlock real insights.
“Here are the problems I heard from you: [summarize]. Did I miss anything?”
“If you had to rank these from most painful to least, what would that look like?”
“If you could magically fix just one today, which would it be?”
(If your problem isn’t at the top, it’s not their biggest priority.)
4. Gauge Urgency (10-20 min)
Not all problems are worth solving. The best ones cause real pain and force people to hack together their own solutions.
“What’s the impact when this problem happens?”
“Have you tried to solve this before? What did you do?”
“If you could magically fix it today, how much would it be worth to you?”
5. Wrap Up (5 min)
“Who else should I talk to about this?”
“Can I reach out again when we have something to test?”
The Prompt: Get a Custom Interview Script
Use this AI prompt to generate a structured discovery interview tailored to your product and audience.
I am conducting customer discovery interviews for [your startup idea].
My target customers are [describe them].
They currently solve this problem by [describe their current method].
I want to uncover their real pain points and willingness to pay.
Generate an interview script with:
✔️ Open-ended rapport-building questions
✔️ Specific prompts to uncover past behavior
✔️ A ranking step where customers score their biggest problems
✔️ Probing questions to assess problem severity
✔️ A closing section to identify next steps
For the problem ranking step, ask:
- “Here are the problems I heard from you: [summarize]. Did I miss anything?”
- “Can you rank these from most painful to least?”
- “If you could fix just one today, which would it be?”
For urgency, include:
- “What’s the impact when this happens?”
- “How have you tried to solve it?”
- “How much is this costing you in time/money/stress?”This prompt ensures that your interviews surface real pain, not polite feedback.
Takeaway: Run This Interview Before You Build
Drew Houston eventually realized that Dropbox’s real market wasn’t casual users who said “cool idea” and never followed through. It was developers and tech teams who were already hacking terrible solutions to sync their files—emailing themselves ZIPs, carrying USB drives, writing their own scripts.
When Dropbox launched with a waiting list, it exploded. From 5,000 signups to 75,000 overnight.
Why? Because it solved a problem people actually felt—and ranked as their biggest pain.
Talk to your customers the right way, and you’ll know if your startup is worth building.
Now go run your first interview.
PS: Was that useful? Leave me a ♡ so I know I’m on the right track.
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