Once upon a time, McDonald’s—in an attempt to boost revenue from a flagging line of business—set out to improve their milkshake sales.
As most companies do, they segmented their market by product (i.e., milkshakes vs. hamburgers) and by demographics (i.e., people who buy milkshakes vs. people who buy hamburgers). From there they surveyed large groups who buy milkshakes, asking lots of questions about the thick beverages. Finally, they gathered small groups who buy milkshakes and had them taste and rate different ones.
From the feedback they got, they changed their milkshakes. Yet sales didn’t improve.
Disappointed but unfazed, McDonald’s tried a totally different approach. They hired an innovative (and, at the time, controversial) team of Harvard researchers to help them figure out the “job” that people “hire” milkshakes to do. Weird concept, I know. But stick with me; it’ll all make sense.
To discover the “job to be done,” the research team spent days at McDonald’s locations, recording who bought milkshakes, when they bought them, where they drank them. They didn’t ask questions. They just watched and documented actual behavior, learning that over 40 percent of milkshakes were sold “to go,” in the morning, to people commuting to work.
Later they returned to McDonald’s and interviewed this large group of milkshake-buying commuters to figure out what “job” they “hired” the milkshake to do. Their summary:
|
Milkshake commuters were facing a long, boring drive and needed something to keep their nondriving hand busy, an activity to make the commute more interesting. |
|
They weren’t yet hungry but knew they’d be hungry by 10 AM. So they wanted something to eat or drink that would keep hunger at bay until noon. |
|
They were in a hurry, wearing work clothes, and they had (at most) one free hand. |
So, instead of getting a muffin or breakfast sandwich, they chose a milkshake because it’s less messy, more filling, and (here’s a fascinating insight) trying to suck a thick liquid through a tiny straw gave them something to do during their boring drive. Understanding this was the “job,” McDonald’s created a milkshake that was thicker (lasts longer, more satisfying) and added chunks of fruit (to make it “more interesting” and, no doubt, create a health halo: “Look, fruit. It’s healthy!”).
Snickers has taken a similar approach by looking for the “job to be done.”
Even if you’ve never eaten a Snickers, you know their classic tagline: “It satisfies.” For more than thirty years, Mars has poured their energy into convincing us that Snickers isn’t a “candy bar” but—much like the McDonald’s milkshake—an easy-to-grab, not-messy meal alternative.
Their 1980s ad nails the job perfectly: “I got deadlines to meet. I can’t let something like hunger get in the way. Snickers fills me up until I can grab a meal. It cuts the hunger. Lets me take care of business.” As does their more recent campaign: “You’re not you when you’re hungry.”
The Mars company arrived at these insights in the same way McDonald’s did. They hired the same Harvard researchers to hang out in convenience stores and airport terminals to watch people buy Snickers. Then, as soon as someone bought a Snickers bar and walked out of the store, the team would interview them using a particular framework (which I’ll share in this chapter).
What they learned was that Snickers customers were mostly young men, hungry (in that “if I don’t get food soon, I’m gonna be angry” way), and in a hurry.
Also—and this is crucial—most of the people who bought Snickers didn’t consider any other candy bars. For them it wasn’t a choice between Snickers and Milky Way; they were choosing between Snickers and other cheap, hunger-satisfying, on-the-go snacks like sandwiches, burritos, or beef jerky. Based on this insight, and by convincing people Snickers isn’t a candy bar at all but a satisfying meal replacement, Mars turned Snickers into the world’s number-one-selling candy bar.
McDonald’s milkshakes and Snickers bars have become iconic and recognized worldwide, not because they’re necessarily tastier or cheaper than their competitors, but because they were developed and marketed based on deeper, often nonintuitive, insights about the “job” they’ve been “hired” to do by their customers.
So, milkshakes and candy bars . . . how do they relate to health and fitness? Well, they don’t. And yes, a milkshake sounds like a terribly unhealthy breakfast. But the principle of searching for the “job to be done” does. That’s because the health and fitness industry has been historically bad at identifying the “job” people are “hiring” our products and services to do. The result? We end up making (and marketing) things with a kindergarten-simple view of customers and then complain that they don’t seem to understand what we’re offering or why it’s important.
It’s time we leveled up.
It’s time to think more deeply about the people we’ve chosen to serve, our clients and customers, and what they’re looking for when they reach out to us. Time invested here pays huge dividends by helping you make and market the things people will line up for, tell their friends about, and buy over and over again.
As mentioned in Chapter 1, I once read a review from a former coaching client. Someone asked her if she would recommend our program, and she responded with something like:
I don’t recommend it. I lost some weight, but I never felt like I connected with my coach. I didn’t really need much help from her. But if I would have needed help, I’m not sure how much I’d have gotten.
You might remember the somewhat ironic nature of this comment: She ended up losing over fifty pounds working with us, improving on nearly every measure collected. Yet she was unhappy, and I wanted to know why. So I offered to pay for an hour of her time and interview her.*
Until that point, I believed that clients would be happy if they lost weight and kept it off, if they improved health markers, and/or if they improved their quality of life, especially if they’d tried and failed using other programs before. All of these were checked off for this client.
However, there was a completely different (and legitimate) reason she didn’t recommend us: She didn’t feel like anyone cared. She didn’t feel heard or understood. Losing weight, while nice, wasn’t enough.** She wanted her coach to be with her every step of the way and her coach wasn’t.
Yes, our team won the battle with fat and preventable disease. But we lost the big one—having a lasting meaningful relationship with our client, one where she felt she got her money’s worth, one where she raved about how we changed her life. And why did we lose? Because we made too many assumptions. Instead of knowing, we guessed. Instead of asking questions, we bought into clichés.
Today, thankfully, Precision Nutrition does much better. But I see this same problem everywhere in health and fitness. It’s the reason why magazine covers haven’t changed in thirty years; men’s magazines continue to drone on about “torching fat” and “rock-hard abs” while women’s magazines talk about “long, lean muscles” and “shapely thighs.”
These “insights” are the product of a surface-level understanding of clients and customers, like the initial McDonald’s approach. This approach rarely works because people’s true motivations are often hidden so deep that they don’t even know what their motivations are until someone strategically uncovers them.
One of my favorite examples of this comes from a discussion with a Precision Nutrition Coaching for Women client. Within a few weeks of joining our coaching group, she was randomly selected to be interviewed. (As we do with all in-depth conversations like this, we paid her for her time.)
During the interview she talked a lot about how she “needed to lose weight” and “realized it was time.” As we asked more about “Why now?” she couldn’t share any additional insights. However, when we asked about what was happening in her life around the time she hired us, lightning flashed. She mentioned something, in passing, about taking her teenage son for a driving test. While this seemed like an irrelevant detail to her, we knew it could be a critical one.
We learned that her son was a competitive swimmer, and she’d spent the last ten years shuttling him around before school, after school, on weekends. She’d spent thousands of hours in service of his goals: driving to and from, and watching, practices and meets, reading books and messing around on her phone while waiting.
One week after taking him for his driving test, Precision Nutrition Coaching appeared in her Facebook feed, and she signed up. The timing wasn’t a coincidence. She’d been wanting to get coaching for years. But it was only after this “trigger”—after her son got his license and no longer needed so much of her care—that she seriously considered taking better care of herself.*
Interestingly, she didn’t notice the connection. Which means surveys, focus groups, and direct questions wouldn’t have uncovered it. Only by assuming less, asking strategic questions, and listening deeply could we figure out the real reason she signed up when she did. This led to some big, strategy-changing questions for our marketing and advertising team:
What percent of our clients are “hiring” coaching after a significant “trigger” event?
(Answer: A big percentage.)
What kinds of “trigger” events could lead someone to “hire” a coaching program?
(Answers: Getting a scary medical diagnosis, a youngest child starting school, a child getting their driver’s license, a child moving away for the first time, separating from a spouse or partner, losing a job, retirement, the loss of someone you’re providing care for, and more.)
What if we started proactively reaching out to people most likely to have a “trigger” event?
(Answer: Our advertising costs go down while conversions go up.)
Sure, folks may want to “lose weight” or “get a flat stomach,” but those aren’t the real answers to the questions: “Why’d you sign up for this program?” “Why now?” Those answers come from a deeper place that’s informed by a holistic picture of their lives. And, as we’ll discuss below, knowing those answers will help shape both your product offerings and your advertising choices.
Of course, it takes mindfulness, even a little moxie, to discard industry clichés and look for the deeper reason people do what they do. But it’s worth it.
Learning more about the jobs people are hiring for means standing out from the shouting headlines, no longer needing pressure tactics or hard selling, and attracting clients who feel calm and confident in your ability to meet their needs.
While there are many ways to learn more about your prospects and clients—and we use a host of them including informal surveys on Facebook, more extensive surveys using SurveyMonkey, in-person focus groups, thinking aloud sessions, and more—our favorite, and most insightful, tool is the Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) framework.
JTBD is an interview-and-analysis technique that seeks to uncover the “jobs” that people “hire” products and services to do. While it feels odd to think that something like a drill can be “hired” to do a job and “fired” if it doesn’t do that job, this is an accurate representation of why people buy things. After all, no one really wants a one-quarter-inch drill bit. They want a one-quarter-inch hole. So they “hire” the drill bit to do the “job” of boring out the hole.
A “job to be done” is not a product, service, or specific solution. It’s the “higher purpose” for which a customer buys products, services, and solutions.
Consider why people “hire” trainers. Is it because they’re desperate to put heavy barbells across their backs and squat up and down more often? Probably not. So why do most trainers fetishize program design and exercise selection? Why doesn’t some portion of their coaching address the deeper needs of clients, usually related to feeling better in their bodies, to reducing both physical and psychic pain? Because they don’t exactly understand the job to be done.*
Likewise, consider why people “hire” physicians. Is it because they want to be on meds or go under the knife? Probably not. So why, then, do most physicians rush through appointments, make it rain prescriptions, and shuttle people to pre-op? Why doesn’t some portion of their doctoring address the deeper needs of patients, usually related to feeling less fragile, to more gracefully accepting their mortality? Because they, too, don’t exactly understand the job to be done.**
The JTBD framework is so valuable because it helps remind us that people don’t buy services or products; they hire relevant solutions at different times to get a wide array of jobs done.***
The Jobs to Be Done framework was created by Harvard Business School professor Clay Christensen. Bob Moesta, one of Christensen’s colleagues from Harvard, shared it with us, and it changed our business. Within one year, after doing dozens of interviews with prospects and clients, and adapting both our product offerings and our marketing/advertising in response to those interviews, our revenue increased by 50 percent.
Sounds good, right? Even better, you can do it yourself.
Here’s how to use it in your own business.
The Jobs to Be Done Framework
STEP 1
Begin with clear questions that you need answered, such as:
Why do people hire my product or service?
Why do people fire my product or service?
How are people struggling with my product or service?
Where are my opportunities to improve my product or service?
STEP 2
Identify people in each of the relevant buying stages, such as:
those who expressed interest but didn’t buy your product/service
those who did buy your product/service
those who bought and are actively using the product/service
those who bought but aren’t actively using the product/service
those who bought but then later returned your product/service
You could also look for people at various stages such as:
It’s also extremely useful to interview prospects who expressed interest in your product or service but didn’t buy, or who went on to buy something else.
STEP 3
Once you’ve identified your groups, conduct structured interviews.
To understand the point of sale, ask:
When did you buy the product?
Where were you?
What time of day was it (daytime/nighttime)?
Was anyone else with you at the time?
How did you buy the product?
To find their first thought about purchasing, ask:
When did you first start looking for something to solve your problem?
Where were you?
Were you with someone? What did they say?
What triggered you to think about this?
To discover what else they considered when weighing their options, ask:
Tell me about how you looked for a product to solve your problem.
What kinds of solutions did you try? Or not try? Why or why not?
To uncover the emotions associated with the purchase, ask:
What was the conversation like when you talked about buying the product with your <spouse/friend/parents>?
Before you bought, did you imagine what life would be like with the product? Where were you when you were thinking this?
Did you have any anxiety about buying? Did you hear something about the product that made you nervous? What was it? Why did it make you nervous?
Of course, these are sample questions that should be modified based on whether you’re interviewing someone hiring your program, firing your program, or in the midst of experiencing your program. In the case of hiring or firing, what’s most important initially is that the interview accesses their memory of events surrounding the action. That’s why we start by asking about “when,” even though we already know exactly when they purchased or dropped out.
From there you might ask, “And where were you when you did this? Were you with anyone? Do you remember what the weather was like?” Again, you’re not necessarily interested in the specific details but in activating their memory and exploring events adjacent to the action. This helps uncover the emotional forces in their decision-making. These are forces that people usually don’t mention because they seem unrelated or uninteresting. However, they provide the best insights for product refinement and/or improved marketing and advertising.
Once the interviews—which you’ve recorded so you can go back to them again—are completed, it’s time to organize what you heard into two popular Jobs to Be Done organizational frameworks: the Timeline and the Forces. These two frameworks help you contextualize the answers you heard. You can then turn the answers into useful stories that help you understand what your clients and prospects are thinking and feeling when they interact with you and your products/services.
STEP 4
THE TIMELINE helps you understand clients’ decision-making, giving you a sense for the thoughts and events that brought them to hiring, using, or firing what you’ve created.
Organize your interviewees’ answers into individual timelines as follows.
To do this exercise, and all upcoming ones, please download our printable + fillable worksheets at www.changemakeracademy.com/downloadable-forms.
STEP 5
THE FORCES helps you map out the feelings that lead a customer toward hiring or firing your thing vs. the forces that lead them away from hiring or firing your thing.
Map out the individual forces that led your interviewees to their decisions.
STEP 6
Look for common themes among your timeline and forces diagrams.
What nudged people to make their decision?
Who did they see as “the competition”?
Which anxieties did they have to overcome to purchase?
How did what they thought they were buying match up to what they actually got?
STEP 7
Ask yourself new questions.
How can I talk about my business in a way that resonates more with how my customers talk about their needs, challenges, and concerns?
How can I reach out to people in places I’ve never considered before?
How can I see my customers’ trajectory and anticipate where they’re heading?
At Precision Nutrition we typically interview about ten people at each stage of their customer journey. For example, to better understand Precision Nutrition Coaching for Men, we interviewed:
MEN WHO DIDN’T BUY
Within one month of registration, we interviewed ten men who expressed interest but didn’t buy coaching.
MEN WHO DID BUY
Within one month of registration, we interviewed ten men who bought coaching.
MEN ACTIVELY USING COACHING
Midway through the program, we interviewed ten men actively using coaching.
MEN NOT ACTIVELY USING COACHING
Midway through the program, we interviewed ten men not actively using coaching.
MEN WHO DROPPED OUT
Within one month of leaving, we interviewed ten men who dropped out of coaching.
Listening carefully to their stories, we constructed a timeline for each individual (the events and thoughts that took them from first idea to buying to consuming or not) and examined the forces at work throughout (the things that pushed them toward buying and away from buying).
Next, we looked at all the individual timelines and forces next to each other and searched for common themes. We looked for what nudged them to make their decision, for whom they thought of as “the competition,” and for which anxieties they had to overcome to purchase. Also, once they purchased, we looked for what they thought they were buying and compared that to what they felt they were actually getting once they used the product or service.
Once you’re finally able to see yourself “through customers’ eyes,” you can ask better questions like:
How can I talk about my business in a way that resonates more with how my customers talk about their needs, challenges, and concerns?
(This might make your products and services more attractive or feel like they’re in better alignment with customer needs. Do this right and they’ll think: Wow, this company understands exactly what I’m looking for!)
How can I reach out to people in places I’ve never considered before?
(This could help open up new markets. For example, if prospects generally sign up for services like yours after a significant “trigger” event—like having a child, getting a scary medical diagnosis, ending a relationship, or moving to a new area—why not market to folks who’ve experienced such an event?)
How can I see my customers’ trajectory and anticipate where they’re heading?
(This could help you develop new products. For example, if you notice people struggling after a twelve-week weight-loss program, you might create a maintenance program designed to help graduates preserve most of their weight loss and come to terms with any rebound weight gain.)
In the end, knowing what clients really want means you don’t assume you know what they want. It means you don’t copy others because you assume they know what clients want. It means you don’t even ask your clients what they want. Instead, it means using the inquisitiveness of a detective and the compassion of a counselor to ask the right questions, listen intently, and think deeply. If you do all three, you’re more likely to unlock their deepest emotional reasons for taking action. In these you’ll see your biggest opportunities in coaching, product development, sales, or marketing. And you’ll easily set yourself apart from everyone else in the industry.
Using the Jobs to Be Done framework, our team at Precision Nutrition has benefited immensely from deep insights about the people who sign up for our products and services, and those who don’t. Here, I’ll share a few of these insights.
Keep in mind that these “user stories” may not describe your clients or the people you want to work with. Which means, like many of the stories in this book, they’re illustrations and examples, not prescriptions. It also means that you’ll need to gather the same kinds of insights with your people, in your business. To do so, I recommend the approach outlined earlier. Also, if you’d like more information (and specific direction) on using the Jobs to Be Done framework, check out the work of Chris Spiek and Bob Moesta at jobstobedone.org.
User story #1: “It’s not my first rodeo.”
PRODUCT: PRECISION NUTRITION COACHING
One of the most important insights we got from the JTBD process was that almost none of the people who express interest in, and eventually sign up for, Precision Nutrition Coaching are trying to “get in shape” or “get healthy” for the first time.
Based on extensive interviews—and follow-up surveys—we learned that the average prospect has tried five health and fitness interventions, with varying degrees of success, before considering our yearlong, practice-based coaching program.
In general, before they discovered us, our male clients tried a wide range of options like workout DVDs (P90X, Insanity, etc.), fitness books (The Abs Diet, Body for Life, etc.), gym options (CrossFit, Orangetheory Fitness, etc.), and personal training. Women tried options like calorie management and prepackaged food (Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, etc.), diet books (The China Study, Skinny Bitch, etc.), boot camps, and detoxes. While this knowledge may seem like a no-brainer, it helped us in several ways.
To begin, it helped shape our paid advertising. For example, we immediately ran a series of ads that spoke directly to this experience. The copy for those ads read something like this:
{Body for Life/Weight Watchers/P90X/Etc.} failed?
Try something different this time.
[Learn more about Precision Nutrition]
Gained the weight back? Again?
Here’s how to keep it off for good.
[Discover Precision Nutrition]
(In some cases the ads were animated with a host of common diet and fitness approaches, appearing in succession, followed by some of the copy above.)
Beyond paid advertising, we started publishing free articles and videos that spoke to the experience. We shared our clients’ stories and histories. Showed how our practice-based, research-proven program is different from the things they tried before. And demonstrated how our program has been able to help people who’ve been unsuccessful in the past, even those who lost hope that any intervention could work for them.
Finally, we revised our coaching curriculum to respect the fact that each successive diet/fitness experiment eroded our clients’ self-confidence and self-efficacy. This meant including content:
highlighting their resiliency (if you’ve tried to get in shape five times already, you’re not a failure, you’re tenacious)
comparing and contrasting what they’ve done before with what they’re doing now (yes, this might feel slower, but has fast and frantic ever worked for you in the past?)
continually reminding them that success is possible (I know it feels frustrating now but take a look at {person Y}, who was in the same boat as you and ended up achieving these remarkable results.)
Now think about your clients and patients. Are they in the same situation, having tried multiple interventions without lasting success? If so, how might you put this insight to work for you?
User story #2: “Help me become ‘that guy.’”
PRODUCT: PRECISION NUTRITION COACHING FOR MEN
As we dug deeper into our interviews with coaching clients, looking separately at our male and female clients, we found new insights specific to each group. One of our biggest men’s coaching insights can be summarized by “Steve’s” story. (Steve isn’t one specific person but a composite based on interviews with dozens of guys.)
Steve is overweight (or at a normal weight but carrying excess body fat). He’s not really focused on doing anything about it at the moment. Maybe he’s not aware of how out of shape he is or maybe he simply doesn’t care. He’s, what we call, liveably overweight/unfit. He can live with it. Which means he has no drive to change his body. Yet.
One day something happens that pulls his health, and his body image, into focus. This trigger is typically an injury, a medical diagnosis, a brush with mortality, an employment change, or a relationship change. In other words, Steve got dumped, changed jobs, injured his leg, or went to the doctor who gave him some potentially scary news.
Steve decides he has to change his image. Because, in his mind, health = image. Steve looks at a guy who’s in shape and thinks, “That guy doesn’t have relationship problems.” Or, “That guy can’t have diabetes.” Or, “That guy is in control of his life.”
Interestingly, if Steve has recently been diagnosed as prediabetic, he doesn’t think: “I gotta find the workout that cures diabetes.” Curing his diabetes does nothing for his image. Instead, Steve wants to look like a fit, healthy guy. And he hopes that once he looks like “that guy,” the diabetes (and associated ego pain) will go away.
Once Steve’s had his health-to-image focusing event, he does something to try to improve his body image. In our research, Steve is likely to try P90X, join CrossFit, or hire a personal trainer, all in an attempt to become more like “that guy” who obviously has a better life than Steve.
Steve may try one thing, or multiple things, to improve his image. And then, at some point, Steve experiences fitness failure. This happens in either one of two ways.
FAILURE TYPE 1:
Steve gets poor results from his fitness attempt(s) and doesn’t change his image (or health) in any measurable way.
FAILURE TYPE 2:
Steve gets some results from his fitness attempt(s) but he’s not where he expected to be. He’s aiming for 100 percent awesome. But right now he’s just at 70 percent and is stuck.
At this point, Steve thinks: Why isn’t this working for me? What am I missing? The answer, he discovers from an extensive search of articles, forums, podcasts, and books is nutrition. So Steve starts searching for nutrition-related information on the internet . . . where he finds Precision Nutrition.
This is the story of how Steve finds his way to Precision Nutrition Coaching for Men.
One additional point about Steve, based on our research: If he’s married, he’s going to seek permission from his partner to sign up. Indeed, the married men we talked to struggled with the idea of “selling” their partners on joining our program for three reasons: time commitment, money, and/or feeling like they need their partners to buy into the diet changes too.
To give you an example, here’s what Steve may hear in his head before he approaches his partner to talk about Precision Nutrition:
TIME COMMITMENT:
“But you’re so busy already; how long is this program really going to take?”
MONEY:
“Can we really afford this, Steve?”
BUY-IN:
“Do we have to change everything and shop and eat differently? I don’t know about this. . . .”
In the end, we summarize this—surprisingly typical—job to be done as:
“Help me become ‘that guy.’ The man I want to look and feel like.”
And we’ve created a formula describing this experience:
Liveably overweight/unfit guy + Health-to-image focusing event + Failed fitness attempt(s) + Search = Sign up for PN Coaching
Aside from this being an interesting story, we’ve used this knowledge to directly inform our advertising, marketing, product creation, and men’s coaching curriculum. For example:
ADVERTISING:
We’ve created ads speaking to guys just like Steve, who realize now that “exercise, alone, isn’t enough” and who’ve experienced something that’s triggered a deeper desire for change.
MARKETING:
We’ve written articles featuring dozens of “guys like Steve,” who’ve experienced what Steve has but who’ve gone on to achieve remarkable results with our help.
PRODUCT CREATION AND CURRICULUM:
Precision Nutrition Coaching used to be marketed as a single coaching program for men and women. After some of our Jobs to Be Done insights, we started promoting two separate programs with two different sets of lessons and practices, tailored more closely to what we learned in our interviews with men and women.
If you work with men, does this story sound familiar? Do you have a group of “Steves” in your practice? If so, how might you put this insight to work for you?
User story #3: “Help me separate eating from feeling.”
PRODUCT: PRECISION NUTRITION COACHING FOR WOMEN
One of our biggest women’s coaching insights can be summarized by Julie’s story. (Again, Julie isn’t one specific person but a composite based on interviews with dozens of women.)
Julie is stuck in a cycle, or a loop. Two loops, actually. But this first one is a tricky one. In this first loop, Julie feels a strong negative emotion like loneliness, anxiety, depression, or stress. To cope with that feeling, Julie turns to food, which helps her (temporarily) feel better. However, coupled with too little exercise and other lifestyle factors, this emotional eating leads to weight gain.
After gaining weight, Julie wants to make a change so she tries something to lose it (Weight Watchers, tracking calories with MyFitnessPal, fasting, cleanses, diet plans, etc.).
Unfortunately, after either 1) not seeing results, or 2) seeing results but gaining the weight back, Julie feels another strong negative emotion like frustration or hopelessness and starts eating emotionally again. The cycle repeats and Julie starts to think: “I know what to do, so why isn’t it working? Why can’t I do this?”
To summarize this first loop:
Julie feels lonely, anxious, depressed, or stressed → Julie eats → Julie gains weight → Julie attempts something to lose weight → Julie fails to lose or keep it off → Julie repeats loop.
Interestingly, as Julie is going through this first cycle of feeling, eating, feeling, eating, she’s also wrapped up in another loop. In the second loop, Julie is “learning” what works for her and what doesn’t. Every time there’s a failed weight-loss attempt (or she gains the weight back) she builds up a set of ideas about what’s “right for her” and what’s not.
The stuff Julie “learns” here may or may not have anything to do with success. In other words, in this second loop, Julie is learning things and making assumptions based on those things. She may be learning useful things or simply developing superstitions, but she’s not really in a position to know the difference between the two.
From this, Julie comes up with a script like:
I tried Weight Watchers, and counting calories isn’t going to work for me. Instead, I need to _______. So, if I hear “counting calories” again, I won’t sign up.
Or:
I tried Jenny Craig, and those little packaged meals aren’t going to work for me. I need to eat my food. So, if I hear “packaged meals,” I’m out. If I hear “eating real food,” I’m in.
As Julie goes through her two concurrent cycles, she’s passively searching for more information and possible solutions to her weight problem. At some point, she hears about Precision Nutrition by:
seeing a post on social media,
hearing about us from someone at her gym,
searching for a key topic like “intermittent fasting,”
reading a guest post we write for another website.
As soon as she discovers our ideas, Julie switches from passive search to active search. In the most common scenario, as Julie is investigating Precision Nutrition, a woman she identifies with—a friend, family member, colleague, or social media connection—recommends us, demonstrates success with us (in the form of a review or photos), or talks about working with us. This social proof leads Julie to believe that our program could work for her.
As Julie digs deeper into Precision Nutrition, she has a simplifying moment, a moment where she learns the answer to the question she’s been subconsciously thinking about all along: “I know what to do . . . so why isn’t it working/why can’t I do it?”
This moment could take place when reading a Precision Nutrition article, taking a free course, watching one of our videos on social media, etc. And it usually comes when she learns:
Less, not more.
Slower, not faster.
She doesn’t have to do it alone.
Nutrition over exercise.
Holistic focus vs. weight focus.
Mind over diet.
Connection with others is vital.
Through this discovery, she learns that Precision Nutrition is different. Not only that, it makes sense to her. She thinks: “Of course! This is why I’ve had a frustrating time losing weight.” After her simplifying moment, Julie begins to check off the criteria she learned previously.
“PN seems like it . . .”
is sustainable over quick
will hold me accountable vs. provide cheap solutions
encourages whole foods over supplements or packaged foods
prioritizes nutrition over exercise
involves giving up control or handing over control even over getting in control
From there, Julie becomes a prime candidate for joining coaching.
In the end, we summarize this job to be done as:
Help me separate eating from feeling. In a way that’s sustainable.
And we’ve created a formula describing this experience:
Loop 1 (feeling, eating, feeling, eating) + Loop 2 (learnings and superstitions) + Search + Social proof + Simplifying moment + Checking off criteria = Sign up for PN Coaching
Again, we’ve used this knowledge to inform our advertising, marketing, product creation, and women’s coaching curriculum. And you can too. Consider your female clients, if you work with women. Can you use these insights in your practice?
Remember that these are just a few user stories based on our research with clients who’ve signed up for our programs. This means they may not necessarily be useful in the context of your business. To really put the JTBD process to work for you, you’ll need to do your own research, as described on pages 82–90.
Also remember that this kind of research doesn’t represent every type of client that’s signed up for our products and programs, although it does represent the majority of them.
Finally, keep in mind that we’ve done this kind of research with each of our six programs and with each segment (people who didn’t buy, people who bought, people who are actively using the program, people who aren’t actively using the program, people who dropped out).
Yes, it’s been a time-consuming process (6 products × 5 segments per product × 10 people per segment × 2 hours per interview = 600 hours of interviews). However, before you think “I don’t have time for this!” consider that we’ve done them over several years, and you can too.
You only need to commit to doing something every week, even if it’s just one interview. By the end of three months you’d have enough information to more deeply understand an entire customer or client segment. The payoff for this investment? Over a few years, you’ll have a gold mine of insights that almost no one else, anywhere, will have.
This will help you finally discover what your clients really want, which has obvious marketing and advertising benefits. While everyone else is just promising surface solutions (Torch body fat now!), you’ll be able to promise something bigger that resonates with their unspoken needs as well as who they are on a deep level (Gain strength, confidence, and the ability to get what you want out of life).
Even more, it’ll help you deliver what your clients really want, adapting your products and services, or creating new ones, based on what you learned from speaking with your target audience. No more guessing, assuming, or following someone else’s lead. Maybe instead of just offering meal plans, you’ll learn that meal plans plus nutrition coaching are the way to go. Maybe instead of just offering diagnostic and prescription services, you’ll learn that health coaching is necessary too.
Making time to do this kind of discovery—and being open to the humbling, yet powerful, insights it produces—has changed our company. By asking new questions we learned with certainty what our clients are after. Nowadays they feel better served and better connected, they stay longer, and we feel happier and more satisfied in our work. I’m confident this approach can do the same for you.
* You’ll often learn a lot more from these “failures” than from your raving fans. It’ll hurt your ego, and maybe your wallet, but learning how and why you went wrong with real honesty is one of the best investments you can make. Think about it as a “preventing future screwups tax.”
** Recent research suggests that when women seek health information, they tend to look for emotional and social support (i.e., you’re gonna be okay and we can help), whereas men tend to look more for informational support (i.e., here’s some stuff you need to know).
* One of my colleagues told me he lives for these moments in his practice: “I learn the most by listening for small details. They’re the most honest and give the biggest clues as to why people behave the way they do.”
* Don’t get defensive, trainers! Of course, program design and exercise selection are important. I’m not saying it’s either one or the other; I’m saying it’s both. Learn how to create great programming and how to connect with the deeper needs of your clients.
** Don’t get defensive, doctors! Of course systemic limitations, patient compliance, and other factors play into this. At the same time, there might be small opportunities to consider and respond to the deeper needs of your patients. If so, lean into those.
*** “I’m a problem solver.” That’s how one of my colleagues describes his work when talking to prospective clients and patients.