I put together the latest six tips by doing/teaching Customer Development in Japan.

1. Customer Development Tips from Japan
Takashi Tsutsumi
August, 2012

2. Tips learned by doing/teaching Customer Development
• No1: The MVP example easy to understand
• No2: PICTzukai to visualize the interaction of players in
Business Model Canvas and how money flows among them.
• No3: Customer Interview League to give exercise for customer
interviews
• No.4: Combine with ideation to expand/find startup idea.
• No 5 : The model to better understand why Customer
Problem is very important.
• No 6: The use of Google AD planning to build Customer
Segment hypothesis.
• Extra: Japanese edition of “Customer Development
Manifesto”

3. Easy example to better
understand MVP

4. What exactly MVP is.
• Imagine if your friends tell you that your
donuts are so delicious that you should sell it
professionally.
This is great!
You should open a donuts
shop.
source: Jon-Eric Melsæter, Flicker

5. Then, you will start thinking
about how you impress
customers…
You will think about how your
donuts can be greater by
expand line-up….
source:Tony Alter, Flicker
source: Shane Adams, Flicker

6. You may want to put your
donuts in a nice box….
source:hlso, Flicker

7. source:The Inn at Key West, Flicker
source: Jazz Guy, Flicker
Then, you start thinking to look for a nice
location and decoration of your shop….

8. In this way, you tends to expand the spec. for
your product further and further.
I call this as “maximum viable product”
syndrome of entrepreneurs.

9. source: Jon-Eric Melsæter, Flicker
But, what you really need to test value proposition
hypothesis is a simple donuts. This should be your first
MVP.
You do not need flavor, line-up, box, nor cool shops….
This example story is originally shared by Nobuyasu Kobayashi, my teaching
partner and the founder and the CEO of Mogura, Inc.

10. Use PICTzukai to visualize the
interaction of players in Business
Model Canvas

11. PICTO-Zukai Diagram
• PICTO-Zukai Diagram is a tool PICTO-Zukai Diagram example for navigation system manufacturer
to visualize a interaction
among players
(customer, you, partner) to
understand how you make a
money and to come up with
new idea how you can make
more money better.
• PICO-Zukai Diagram is invented
by Mr.Itabashi, formerly new
business development
professional at Recruit and
now consultant for his own
invented method.
• PICTO-Zukai Diagram is a great
complimentary tool to
Business Model Canvas which
is some what limited to
capture money-product flow
and continues deal flow.

12. PICTO-Zukai Diagram Notation
To describe PICTO-Zukai Diagram for your
business, you will use a few elements such as
3W1H, customer, company, product, money
with connectors (2 kinds of arrows) and
option( timeline and sum).
One important rule is to draw two arrows
always as a pair (sale and payment) because a
business is always exchange of something.

13. PICTO-Zukai Diagram example
Let’s describe PICTO-Zukai Diagram for Google!
To whom Google is selling what at how much?
Yes, to web viewers, search .
But, Google also selling Adwords to advertisers.
Search Search
AD
Advertiser
Google
Google
Customer Customer
(Web viewers)
$
(Web viewers)
$ $
0 dollar 0 dollar
(Free) (Free)
In this way, you can visualize a multi-sided model clearly. From this diagram, you
can easily understand the two value proposition hypothesis to test.

14. PICTO-Zukai Diagram example (cont’d)
Let’s draw another PICTO-Zukai diagram for a
printer company.
The company also sells printer tonner.
But, comparing to a printer, a tonner is sold
repeatedly. To capture a repeat sales, use
Printer
horizontal line with “T”, which means goods to
Printer Company
sell on a long term horizon.
Printer
$ Customer
$ Customer
Printer Company
tonner
$
tonner
T
$
This kind of sequential sales is not well captured
in BMC, another complimentary point by PICTO-
Zukai diagram.
By visualizing time sequential nature, you can test
a hypothesis for repeat-sales-good effectively on
your interviewing customer.

15. PICTO-Zukai Diagram with BMC
Let’s draw PICTO-Zukai diagram for Free Mobile Phone (BMG P.104)
Bait & Hook Model
Mobile Phone
$
Mobile Phone Company
Customer
0 dollar
(Free)
Subscription
$
Subscription
T
$
Bait & Hook of Free Mobile Phones PICTO-Zukai Diagram of
(BMG P.104) Free Mobile Phones

16. PICTO-Zukai Diagram with BMC

17. PICTO-Zukai book
Sample of pictogram
PICTO-Zukai, Satoru Itabashi, 2010

18. Help shay or hesitated
entrepreneurs to get used to
customer interview

19. Customer Interview League
• In-class interview
exercise
• FORCE to form two
pairs to do
interview, keep
changing the pairs so
that each can have 5-
10 interviews.
• Result
– momentum for further
interviews outside the class
– Now strongly convinced
their hypothesis is not
always correct.

20. For entrepreneurs without big
startup idea,
combine with ideation tools

21. Combine with Idea Generation
• Teaching idea generation tools before Customer
Development works well when students alone
cannot extract their own innovation
capability, particularly in Japan where people
tend not to express their own idea/opinion
publicly.
• The example of Idea Generation framework
– SCAMPER
– TRIZ(Teoriya Resheniya Izobreatatelskikh Zadatch)
– QFD(Quality Function Development)

22. SCAMPER
• Substitute
• Combine
• Adapt
• Modify, Magnify, Minimize
• Put to other uses
• Eliminate
• Reverse

23. TRIZ (Teoriya Resheniya Izobreatatelskikh Zadatch )
Source: TRIZ jornal

24. Consumer Needs Architecture
The model to help entrepreneurs better understand why serious
customer problem is key in Customer Discovery

25. Consumer Needs Architecture
Consumer needs arise from “be
needs”. People want to “be
happy”, “be successful”, “be Basic needs
safe”, and so on , all of which are Live a life in xxx way
“Be needs”. “Be needs” is basic (Enjoy a life in yyy way) generic / static
How to achieve
What to achieve
needs for human-being. It is
generic and static(rarely
changed )
“Be” needs
“Be needs” create “Do needs”
because you need some
actions(“Do”) to satisfy “Be
needs”).
“Do” needs
“Do needs” create “Have need”
because people need some
“goods or services” to satisfy “Do
needs” by doing something, Occasional needs
specific / dynamic
“Do needs” and hence “Have
needs” are specific. They are
also dynamic because actions
“Have” needs
(and the tools for them) evolve
as the degree/natures of More variety of needs
satisfaction for “Be” needs
evolve.
Source: “Shohisya Shinri No Shikumi, Consumer Needs Architecture is invented by Dr. Nobuyoshi
Dobunkan Publishing, Author: Dr. Umezawa.
Nobuyoshi Umezawa.

26. In order to be something/in
some status, people want to do If there is goods or services that enable people
something to make happen. to do the thing, then people want to have it.
In this case, all three levels of need are
satisfied, so no chance for your product have any
needs.
But, if there is no goods or services to do the
thing, then people have a PROBLEM because
they cannot do the thing they want to do.
In addition, even if there is goods or services to do
the thing, but they don’t do a good job hence people
cannot do well what they want to do, people have a
SERIOUS PROBLEM. It is SERIOUS because they
already try(buy) it to do the thing seriously.
A serious problem is a great indicator for unsatisfied
serious “Do need”.
That is why, it is very important to make sure that a
serious problem that your product can solve exists
(=a problem hypothesis testing).

27. Example: SC Johnson Oil Disposal Aid
Be needs: be clean and be responsible for
environment
Do needs: dispose the oil I used for deep frying
or tempura NOT to the pipes BUT in the
garbage
To do so, I currently pour the used oil into a
source: The web of Aichi prefecture
used milk pack filled with used news paper, but
it is cumbersome, the hands get dirty and the
This became
oil some time spilled over. category leader
serious problem! in Japan.
Consumer
remember
product name as
New Product: Oil disposal aid a category name!!
Value Prop: you can harden unwanted oil and
throw it away in the garbage. Better for the
environment, and most certainly better for the
pipes in your home!
Oil Disposal Aid
source: The web of SC Johnson
Source: “Shohisya Shinri No Shikumi,
Dobunkan Publishing, Author: Dr.
“Have” needs emerge to solve
Nobuyoshi Umezawa. serious problem.

28. Use of Google AD planning to build
Customer Segment hypothesis

29. Use of Google AD planning to build Customer Segment
hypothesis
• Google Ad planning is a tool to search the best
media for your product so that the media you
choose well matches with target customer
segment.
• Here, use it in opposite way to find out the
segment you should target by looking around
some media and its viewers and their
behaviors.

30. First, pick up some website
which you believe your
potential customers will like
therefore often visits.
Then, type them in here to
get view profile stats..
source: Google

31. Then, the attributes of visitors appears as follows;
# of visitors
Salary
Age
interests
SEX
Other
website
visitors visit
source: Google

32. Repeat for several websites, compile the data and you will come up
with;
Customer Segment Hypothesis
Age: 30 – 40
SEX: Female
Salary: LT JPN5M
Interest: education, child care, foods, health
Popular site: Bennese, Yomiuri Komachi, OKwave, Allabout.
This tips is originally shared by Kensuke Sekine, one of our students at Club
86 startup school.

33. Japanese edition of “Customer
Development Manifest”

34. 顧客開発の鉄則
スタートアップとは、繰り返し可能で拡大できるビジネスモデルを探索
するための一時的な組織である。
1. オフィスの中には事実はない。だから（事実を求めて）オフィスの外に出るの
だ。
2. 顧客開発はアジャイルな製品開発と組み合わせなければならない。
3. 探索において失敗はつきものである。
4. 失敗を恐れることが失敗につながる。
5. ピボットして反復すべきかどうかインサイトに基づいて判断せよ。
6. 実験を行って仮説を検証せよ。
7. お金の出し手や共同創業者による（顧客開発を実施することへの）合意が成功
への第一歩。
8. ビジネスプランは顧客と対話をした途端に修正することになる。だから（１枚
にまとまって、更新も容易な）ビジネスモデルキャンバスを使え。
9. スタートアップは皆同じだと思ってはいけない。それぞれ違っている。
10. スタートアップのための経営管理指標は既にある企業のそれとは異なる。
11. 市場タイプについてコンセンサスを得たか？市場タイプでやり方が全て変わる
のだ。
12. 躊躇せず素早い意思決定、短いサイクル時間、スピードとテンポが大事。
13. パッションがなければ、始めた途端に行き詰る。
14. スタートアップの組織は大企業の組織とは異なる。
15. ビジネスモデルを探索している間は資金流出をとにかく抑えろ。逆に一度それ
が発見できたら一気に資金を投じろ。
16. 学んだことを話して共有することが大事。
17. スタートアップでは、カオスと不確実性を好むくらいの気構えが必要。
出典：Steve Blank Blog、訳：堤孝志

35. Any questions?
Contact me at
ttutumi@gmail.com