How To Ask Customer Interview Questions That Get Meaningful Responses

When conducting market research, it’s important to ask the right questions.

There are lots of different ways to ask questions, but it’s important to be clear about what you want to know, and how you want to know it. Otherwise, you might not get the answers you’re looking for, and your product could fall flat.

For example, if you’re trying to figure out what products people want, you need to think about the things that are important to them. Is it the price? The quality? What will they use it for?

Through asking questions such as the ones previously mentioned, you can find out what people need to make their lives easier, more fun, and more fulfilling. Then you can use that information to improve your products and services, so that people will be able to continue enjoying life in an intuitive, efficient manner. You can also use this information to see where there are gaps in the market, so that you can fill them with new and innovative ideas of your own.

Avoid Leading Questions

Leading questions are ones that deliberately (or inadvertently) elicit a certain response, either from the person you’re interviewing or from the larger population you’re trying to examine.

A leading question shows bias: it creates a frame or an association in the mind of your interviewee before they even start answering, and it will influence what they say. An interviewer may intend for these effects to help them get a better answer, but it can end up accidentally getting misleading information or prevent the researcher from getting useful answers.

Leading questions don’t give respondents the chance to think about their answers, which means they can’t gain new insights into their own mindsets and behaviors.

For example, if you ask people “Why are you looking forward to going to the dentist?”, you assume that they are looking forward to going to the dentist. It doesn’t leave room for people to express how much they hate going to the dentist. A better question would be “What are your feelings about going to the dentist?” or “What do you like/dislike about going to the dentist?” Questions like this allow you to get accurate and unbiased data that will help you make good decisions. 

Open-Ended Questions

Asking open ended questions allows an interviewer to understand your perspective on a certain topic or idea. It also gives the respondent an opportunity to talk at length about their opinion and share as much information as they wish, instead of being limited by a set number of multiple choice answers.

Open-ended questions can be beneficial for researchers who want a better understanding of what their respondents think on a particular subject and can help them find out more about why people do what they do or have certain opinions. Open-ended questions in market research can also provide insight into the motivations behind people’s actions or decisions.

When you are doing any type of market research, it is important to ask as many open-ended questions as possible because this will allow you to get a feel for how your target audience really feels about your product or service. This data will be most useful when creating new products or determining what customers really want from your company.

Ask About Features

It’s important to ask questions about features because you want to know if the features you currently include are sufficiently meeting the needs of your users. And if they’re not, users can tell you what you could add to meet their needs. 

Good examples of open ended questions you could ask about features are:

  • What are your thoughts about the current features of X?
  • What features could we add to better meet your needs?
  • How do you feel about the current set of features?
  • Why does our current set of features adequately meet your needs or inadequately meet your needs?
  • When during the user experience could you use a different or added feature?

Ask About Ease of Use

It’s important that you know how easy it is to use your products or services. It might seem simple to those who developed the product or app how to use it, but it may lack a sense of intuitiveness for new users. 

Here are some examples of open-ended questions to ask about the ease of use of your products:

  • What was your experience learning how to use our product?
  • How long did it take to feel comfortable using this product?
  • What would make this product easier to use?
  • Could this product be used by someone else with no prior experience with X?

Ask About Recommendations

Finally, it’s a great idea to ask about recommendations users have for the future of your products. Ask questions such as:

  • What recommendations do you have to make this product better in any way?
  • What recommendations do you have to enhance the value of this product?
  • How would you recommend we change to make X better?
  • What recommendations do you have for us concerning this product?

Scale Questions

Asking questions based on a scale makes it easier to to interpret and categorize the data you receive during market research. On top of that, it also allows you to get a clear numerical value associated with feelings. An example of this would be “On a scale of 1-10 with 1 meaning unlikely and 10 meaning Absolutely Will, how likely would you be to recommend X to someone else?”

This allows users to consider how they feel about your products and give you a clear answer. Scaled questions can be on a scale of 1-10, 1-5, or really anything. We recommend scales of 1-5 or 10 for maximum ease. 

Questions you could ask and their associate scales are:

  • How easy was it to use X? Really Easy vs Really Hard
  • What was the learning curve like for X? Really Easy vs Really Hard
  • Will you recommend X to your friends? Never vs For Sure
  • How do you feel about the price of X? Too Expensive vs Perfectly Priced

PeopleFish

If you want to ensure you’re asking the best questions that elicit meaningful responses, PeopleFish is the right choice for you! PeopleFish makes it easy to conduct great quality market research. Here at PeopleFish, we make conducting market research easy, and we help you get the vital customer feedback you need.

We can help you ask the right questions, so when you’re ready to take your business to the next level, you can do it with confidence that what you’re offering the world is exactly what they want! Get started conducting quality market research today!