Leave with an interview guide and a structured evidence record.
Start with a real buying situation
For the worked example, the audience is a founder who has paid for campaigns without clear reporting. Their problem is that the team cannot connect campaign activity to qualified enquiries. The desired practical outcome is an agreed definition of a qualified enquiry and a usable reporting baseline.
The example is deliberately bounded: the client must approve claims and creative before launch. That condition should influence the promise, scope and next step rather than disappear from the marketing copy.
| Illustrative offer | a 30-day campaign planning and measurement engagement |
|---|---|
| Buyer question | What makes an enquiry worth your sales team’s time? |
| Possible evidence | a sample campaign brief showing audience, offer, source and qualification fields |
| Useful asset | a lead qualification and campaign brief |
How to complete your customer interview guide
- Choose a learning question and recruit people who have relevant experience.
- Ask about a recent event rather than a hypothetical preference.
- Follow the sequence: trigger, attempted solution, decision and result.
- Record direct quotations with permission and keep interpretation separate.
- Look for repeated evidence while retaining contradictions and exceptions.
Worked example
These entries are illustrative planning material, not research findings or customer results. Keep the structure and replace the content with verified details.
| What we need to learn | Understand how a founder who has paid for campaigns without clear reporting deals with this problem: the team cannot connect campaign activity to qualified enquiries. |
|---|---|
| A recent incident to explore | What makes an enquiry worth your sales team’s time? |
| Follow-up questions | What happened next? Who was affected? What did you try? What did you compare before deciding? |
| Evidence and exact language | Record the participant’s exact account with permission. Example to investigate, not a finding: “The last agency sent reports but no useful leads.” |
| What remains uncertain | We have not yet established the frequency, cost or prevalence of the problem. Test those assumptions in further conversations. |
Review before using it
A useful operational measure in this example is cost per qualified enquiry alongside the qualification rate. That does not automatically make it a marketing attribution metric. Define the source, period and owner before drawing conclusions.
- Would the questions still make sense if the interviewee never bought from us?
- Check the delivery assumptions: Keep media spend, agency fees and production costs separate.
- Use evidence rather than promises. Do not guarantee leads, revenue or return on ad spend.
- Discuss the draft with someone who understands the buying situation. Start with: “What makes an enquiry worth your sales team’s time?”
- If the next step is a trial, define its purpose. One possible starting point is to test one offer for one audience with a written budget cap.
Common mistakes and a better review
Do not fill a missing fact with an impressive-sounding number. Mark it as an assumption, explain how you will check it and give that check an owner. A short, honest document is easier to use than an elaborate plan built on unknowns.
| Watch for | Asking whether someone likes your solution encourages polite approval. |
|---|---|
| A real buyer concern | The last agency sent reports but no useful leads. |
| Useful response direction | Let us define a useful enquiry together and agree what evidence would show whether this test is working. |
| Evidence to collect | The buyer’s own account, a sample campaign brief showing audience, offer, source and qualification fields, and records relevant to cost per qualified enquiry alongside the qualification rate. |
Your working sheet
Write your own version below. Notes are saved on this browser when local storage is available. Use Download to keep a separate copy; avoid adding confidential information on a shared device.
Example: Understand how a founder who has paid for campaigns without clear reporting deals with this problem: the team cannot connect campaign activity to qualified enquiries.
Example: What makes an enquiry worth your sales team’s time?
Example: What happened next? Who was affected? What did you try? What did you compare before deciding?
Example: Record the participant’s exact account with permission. Example to investigate, not a finding: “The last agency sent reports but no useful leads.”
Example: We have not yet established the frequency, cost or prevalence of the problem. Test those assumptions in further conversations.
Review your work
Tick only what you can support with your answer or practice. This is a reflection checklist, not an automated assessment.
Questions about this resource
How do I adapt this for my marketing agencies business?
Replace the audience, offer and evidence with your actual information. Begin with a recent buyer conversation about why the team cannot connect campaign activity to qualified enquiries, then check which assumptions match your business.
Is the filled example ready to publish?
No. It is a working example. Verify claims, permissions, prices, current capabilities and any customer information before using it externally. Do not guarantee leads, revenue or return on ad spend.
What should I do after completing the worksheet?
Use it to make one decision or have one focused conversation. The intended output is an interview guide and a structured evidence record. Set a review date and update it when the evidence changes.
Illustrative business worksheet. No customer results, market rates, traffic volumes or performance benchmarks are implied. About these resources.