Talk to users (the TAB system)
> The best marketing to developers comes from talking to developers. That's it. Everything else in this repo is downstream of this skill.
Use this when: you've never done a real user interview, your messaging is clever but unverified, or you keep debating the roadmap internally instead of asking the people who feel the pain.
The core idea
Stand up a Technical Advisory Board: 30-50 people who represent your users and buyers, not grey-haired advisors telling you how to build. You interview them, on repeat, and let their words become your positioning, roadmap, and homepage copy.
A TAB call is not a demo and not a sales call. It's an interview. You never mention the product.
Framework: the TAB system (Frankl)
Composition
- One+ representative of every persona that touches the product (see who-is-this-for)
- Both users (interact) and customers (pay), often different people
- Target 30-50 members
Cadence
- 30 minutes · one-on-one · monthly · for ~6 months
- Zoom, recorded with permission, never in person
- Same questions every time · never pitch
Recruitment (it's a numbers game)
- Personalize every message, never batch-and-blast
- Lead with their problem, not your startup
- Max 4 sentences
- ~10% reply → plan ~500 outreaches for ~50 members
- No payment: early access, influence, swag
Template:
Dear [Name],
Your post about [specific problem] was genuinely sharp.
I'm building something to attack [that problem] and I'd value your view. Would
you consider joining my technical advisory board?
If so, reply and I'll set up a short call to explain what's involved.
The 7 questions (never more than 7 in 30 min)
- Magic wand: "If you could wave a magic wand and change anything about how you do [task], what would it be?"
- The stakes: "If we delivered that, how would it change your day / your work?"
- Why now: "What's different about the world now that makes this more valuable than five years ago?"
- What caused this problem in your org?
- What have you tried, and why did it fall short?
- What happens if nothing changes for another year?
- Where do you go to stay current on this? (who/what they trust)
Analyze: turn transcripts into assets
Highlight complete sentences (not fragments) into four buckets, then synthesize the top 3-5 of each, in the interviewee's exact words:
| Bucket | You're mining for |
|---|---|
| Pains | bad outcomes, risks, obstacles |
| Gains | outcomes they want |
| Jobs | what they're trying to accomplish |
| Environmental changes | trends making the pain worse over time → your villain |
Those four buckets feed directly into positioning-and-story and value-prop-that-converts.
Mistakes that look reasonable
- Interviewing friends: they're nice and useless. You need people who'll say no.
- Pitching mid-interview: the moment you demo, they start being polite instead of honest.
- Leading questions: "wouldn't it be great if…" gets you the answer you fished for.
- Batch outreach: a templated blast to 200 people gets 200 ignores. Personalize or don't send.
- Asking for solutions: users are experts in their pain, not in your product. Mine the pain.
Your next 30 minutes
- [ ] List every persona from
who-is-this-for; you need TAB members for each. - [ ] Find 10 people who've publicly posted about the problem (HN, Reddit, GitHub issues, X).
- [ ] Send 10 personalized, 4-sentence, problem-first invites. Today.
- [ ] Lock your 7 questions (3 above + 4 tailored). Do not exceed 7.
- [ ] After 3 calls, fill the Pains/Gains/Jobs/Changes table with real quotes.
Built from real dev-tool GTM experience, with frameworks from Adam Frankl (The Developer-Facing Startup) and Jakub Czakon (markepear.dev).
When a framework can't make the call, that's what a human is for: The DevTool GTM Company.
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