E89: Validate first—for success later—with Marcel Petitpas

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Marcel Petitpas is a rising talent in the world of keynote speaking. His focus is on helping youth and forward-thinking organizations alike to improve their mindsets and embrace the discomfort that comes with achieving meaningful results. Marcel has worked with Fortune 100 companies, as well as top speakers and coaches. He’s now working on a software tool that he co-founded, called Parakeeto, which helps companies run more efficiently and profitably. He spent significant time on customer development for this software.

If you’re an agency owner dreaming of selling software that you’ve developed, this episode is for you.

Highlights:

• How to get started in customer development.
• What to consider when planning a customer interview during validation.
• What happens when you ask for money during customer validation.
• How Marcel filled the gap between customer development and starting to build.
• Best advice ever received: A business’ job is to create ten times more value than it captures.
• Habit that contributes to success: Fitness regiment and pushing into discomfort.
• Favorite tool: Station.io, Vidyard, Stormboard
• Book recommendations: Lean Customer Development by Cindy Alvarez

Links:

• Parakeeto.com/ugurus – agency scaling playbook
• Marcel’s facebook

Quotes:

• “He has the problem…do other agency owners have that problem?”
• “It was really important that we standardized”
• “That’s a really critical step — asking for money.”
• “A lot of people want to be nice.”
• “It was a hustle, for sure.”

Takeaways:

• Are you considering taking something you’ve developed to market? Take time to plan out your customer development, read up on the subject, and check out Parakeeto.com/ugurus – agency scaling playbook.