Customer discovery: segments, routines, the painkiller, the viral loop

Part of the «Waze для рыбалки» wiki · Strategy + field instrument, 2026-07-02 · Status: ready to deploy
Related: Segments & WTP · Big questions · Konstantins interview

What we're optimizing for (the growth thesis)

Not revenue — habit. The metrics that matter first: DAU · MAU · 7‑day (L7) active · retention · time spent. That implies a specific kind of product and a specific kind of discovery:

• A daily trigger, not an occasional tool. An angler fishes maybe weekly in season, but should open the app daily — for a bite/weather/ice check, a report, a photo, a chat. Discovery's #1 job is to find what that daily check is.
• Off‑season survival. MAU dies in the spring‑ban and deep‑winter troughs unless something holds it. Hypothesis: ice (winter) + content + planning. Validate it.
• A viral loop. Fishing is intrinsically social (buddies, clubs, bragging). The loop candidates: invite‑your‑buddy, shareable catch cards, private circles, competition/leaderboard bragging. Find which one anglers would actually pull.
• Zero barriers. No registration to read (the gdebenz lesson), one‑tap to write, browser/PWA first. Discovery should confirm nothing we add creates friction.
• Subsidized distribution is on the table. Founding‑guide program, raffles, pond/forum partnerships. The survey is itself the first distribution + seeding act.
• Monetize later. The P2P/tourism layer is the eventual engine; for now, grow the habit and the data.

Metric → what discovery must uncover:

Method: survey for breadth, interviews for truth

• Survey (Google Form) — segments the population and quantifies routines and priorities. Fast, distributable, anonymous. Weak on real pain (people rationalize in surveys), so it leans on past‑behavior questions and ends by recruiting interviewees.
• Interviews (15–30 min, Mom Test) — where the real pain surfaces. Anchor on the last actual trip, never on the idea. Don't pitch.

Both feed and correct the hypotheses already in segments and the activity calendar.

The survey (deployable — RU version is the live one)

Intro copy: "Помоги сделать приложение для рыбаков Латвии. 5–7 минут, анонимно. Правильных ответов нет — интересна твоя реальная рыбалка. В конце можно оставить контакт для раннего доступа." Incentive: raffle (gear voucher / pond day‑ticket) + early access. ~24 questions, mostly one‑tap; the open‑ended pain and "one thing" questions are the gold.

Section 1 — About you (segment)
1. How often do you fish in season? (less than monthly / 1–3× month / weekly / several×/week / almost daily)
2. How long have you fished? (<2 / 2–5 / 5–15 / 15+ yrs)
3. Types you do (multi): spinning · feeder/float · ice (mormyshka/tip‑ups) · carp · fly · sea/shore · boat trolling
4. Main species (multi): pike · zander · perch · bream/roach · carp · trout/salmon · sea (flounder/cod) · other
5. Where (multi): rivers · lakes · sea/coast · paid ponds · reservoirs
6. Boat? (none / rowing / motor)
7. Region (Riga+Pieriga / Vidzeme / Kurzeme / Zemgale / Latgale)
8. Club / competitions? (no / occasionally / regularly / sport athlete)
9. Language (RU / LV / both)

Section 2 — Your rhythm (daily / weekly / monthly / annual)
10. On a normal non‑fishing day, how often do you think about or look up something fishing‑related? (not really / sometimes / every day I check something)
11. Before a trip, what do you check? (multi + other): weather · pressure · wind · water level/temp · forums/chats · maps · bite forecast · moon calendar · nothing
12. Think about your LAST trip — how did you decide where to go? (open) ← Mom Test gold
13. In peak season, trips per week? (0–1 / 2 / 3 / 4+)
14. In winter / off‑season, what do you do fishing‑wise? (multi + other): ice fishing · read/watch content · buy gear · prep tackle · nothing, just wait

Section 3 — Tools you use now (current behavior)
15. What do you actually use? (multi): forums (ribak.lv/copeslietas) · FB groups · Telegram/WhatsApp chats · YouTube · weather apps (Windy…) · maps (Google/Navionics) · Mana Cope · Fishbrain/Deeper · nothing, from memory
16. How do you find new spots? (open)
17. Roughly how much do you spend on fishing per year? (gear, ponds, fuel, licences) — <€100 / €100–500 / €500–1500 / €1500+ ← real‑spend signal (segments WTP)

Section 4 — The pain (painkiller signal)
18. What makes a trip a bust — what frustrates you most? (open) ← the pain
19. What would you want to know before a trip but can't find out today? (open)
20. Which of these did you actually miss on the water last season? (1–5 each, "never … constantly"): where it's biting · ice safety · can I fish here legally · conditions forecast · who to go with · where it's less crowded · gear deals · depth maps ← recalled pain, not a wishlist

Section 5 — Social / virality
21. Who do you usually fish with? (alone / a friend or two / a group / a club)
22. Do you share catches/photos? Where? (don't / privately in WhatsApp‑type DMs / in a chat/group / publicly on social/forum)
23. When did you last recommend a fishing app, channel, or piece of gear to someone? What was it, and why did it land? (open) ← past sharing behavior predicts virality

Section 6 — The daily habit (DAU)
24. What would the app need so you'd open it EVERY day, even when not going fishing? (open) ← the DAU key

Section 7 — Close
25. If the app could do ONE thing for you, what would it be? (open) ← the North Star / painkiller
26. (optional) Can we talk for 15 min (voice/in person)? Leave a contact (Telegram/WhatsApp/email) — recruits interviewees
27. (optional) Want early access? Leave a contact.

Design notes: Q12, 16, 18, 19, 22, 23 anchor on real behavior (Mom‑Test‑clean). Q20 is framed as recalled pain ("what you actually missed last season"), not "how useful would it be" — the difference between memory and wishlist. Q24/25 stay aspirational‑open — kept to capture the respondent's own words, not to "validate" the idea. Keep the survey to ≤7 min or completion drops.

The interview guide (Mom Test, 15–30 min)

Rules: don't pitch; anchor on the past; ask for specifics and stories; shut up and listen. Never "would you use…"; always "when did you last…".

1. "Tell me about your last fishing trip — from the start, how did the whole thing go?" (let them narrate; follow the energy)
2. "How did you decide where and when?"
3. "What went wrong, or what would've made it better?"
4. "When was a trip a total bust recently? What happened?"
5. "What did you do so it wouldn't happen again?"
6. "Show me what's on your phone for fishing — open the apps/chats you use." (observe real behavior)
7. "What did you last spend money on for fishing?" (real spend = real signal)
8. "Who do you call or text when you're heading out?" (the social graph → virality)
9. Only at the very end, if at all: "We're thinking about X — does anything about that resonate, and who else should I talk to?"

Target: 8–12 interviews, spread across segments (ice angler, Riga spinning, feeder, carp, paid‑pond, Latgale, one guide). Konstantins is #1 and can recruit the rest.

Distribution plan (and it's the first growth experiment)

• Konstantins first — takes the survey, then posts it where the anglers actually are: ribak.lv, "Fishing LV" FB group, copeslietas.lv (LV), Telegram/WhatsApp fishing chats, and his own contacts.
• Bilingual is mandatory, and both forms now exist — build_survey_RU.gs (Konstantins' network) and build_survey_LV.gs (copeslietas.lv, the 30k FB group), both native-angler reviewed, same questions. Run each as its own Google Form; keep RU and LV response streams separable for segmentation.
• Incentive (subsidized distribution, on‑brand): raffle a gear voucher or a paid‑pond day; everyone who leaves a contact gets early access + "founding angler" status (feeds the reputation system later).
• Seeding doubles as recruiting — the contacts collected become the first interviewees, the first reporters, and the founding‑guide shortlist.
• Watch the distribution itself: which channel converts, how far it forwards (an early read on the viral loop).

Success criteria

• ≥150 survey responses, with ≥30 in each major segment (ice / spinning / feeder / carp / paid‑pond) and a real RU + LV split.
• 8–12 interviews done, across segments.
• Concrete answers to: the daily trigger (Q24), the painkiller (Q18/19/25), the viral loop (Q21–23), and a validated/corrected routine per segment.
• Output: update segments and the roadmap with what's real vs what we assumed; pick the one feature that is both the painkiller and the daily habit to build the MVP around.