The Mom Test: How to talk to customers & learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you

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(as of Jan 17, 2025 07:12:13 UTC – Details)

The Mom Test is a quick, practical guide that will save you time, money, and heartbreak.

They say you shouldn’t ask your mom whether your business is a good idea, because she loves you and will lie to you. This is technically true, but it misses the point. You shouldn’t ask anyone if your business is a good idea. It’s a bad question and everyone will lie to you at least a little . As a matter of fact, it’s not their responsibility to tell you the truth. It’s your responsibility to find it and it’s worth doing right .

Talking to customers is one of the foundational skills of both Customer Development and Lean Startup. We all know we’re supposed to do it, but nobody seems willing to admit that it’s easy to screw up and hard to do right. This book is going to show you how customer conversations go wrong and how you can do better.

From the Publisher

The Feedback Fallacy

When we go ask people for feedback about our idea…

People say you shouldn’t ask your mom whether your business is a good idea. That’s true, but it misses the point…

We feel like we’re being scientific

You shouldn’t ask anyone whether your business is a good idea. At least not in those words. Everyone will lie at least a little. Ultimately it’s a bad question.

When we’re really just fishing for compliments

We’re putting our precious idea on the line…So people respond with compliments and opinions. It’s not their responsibility to show us the truth. It’s our responsibility to find it.

It convince us we’re on the right track, even when we’re not

You want to understand what they’re already doing and why. This understanding lets you come to your own conclusion about the product they’ll need.

Stop wasting your time

Entrepreneurs are universally busy, yet odds are high that you’re wasting huge amounts of time sitting in pointless meetings and building unnecessary features. Talking to customers takes time, so it’s worth doing right.

Take two hours to read this book and you’ll see it repaid tenfold.

Rob Fitzpatrick, author and entrepreneur

Learn how to design and teach educational workshops that work every time.

Whether workshops are your whole world or just a small part, The Workshop Survival Guide will equip you with the tools to design and run a brilliant session, every time, with no stress or drama. Folks tend to think a successful workshop is all about the facilitation (which does matter, and we’ll cover that too), but the real magic is in the design you do ahead of time. It’s a simple process that anyone can learn, and which will get you to the real goal: a happy audience.

Rob Fitzpatrick

Understand your customers. Build desirable products. Write useful books

Alongside running a variety of little businesses over the past fourteen years, Rob is the author of three practical handbooks to what he’s learned along the way.

His books are taught at universities like Harvard, MIT, and UCL, and are used as training manuals at companies like SkyScanner and Shopify. He has run training programs at companies like HP and Sony Mobile, and has helped coach countless startups and entrepreneurs. His advice is thoughtful, battle-tested, and pleasantly practical.

The Mom Test: How to talk to customers and figure out if your business is a good idea when everybody is lying to you The Workshop Survival Guide: How to design and run education workshop that work every time Write Useful Books: A modern approach to designing and refining recommendable nonfiction

Publisher ‏ : ‎ CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform; 1st edition (September 10, 2013)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 136 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1492180742
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1492180746
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 5.9 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 0.31 x 8.5 inches