Incy TemplatesCustomer Interview Planner
A ready-to-use interview script and a target list of who to talk to and why.
Plan a round of customer interviews that produce evidence instead of polite agreement.
Part of the Customer Discovery Kit family. Also see: Customer Discovery Kit: the Guide, Assumption and Evidence Tracker, Evidence Analyser.
- Version
- 1.2
- Last updated
- 10 Jun 2026
- Completion time
- 25–40 min
- Formats
- markdown
About this template
Includes a target-list worksheet for deciding who to talk to and why, and an interview script built to avoid leading questions — the single most common way founders accidentally confirm what they already believed. Works for five interviews or fifteen.
Instructions
- Build your target list: who specifically, and why them — not "potential customers" in the abstract.
- Write your script around the past and present ("tell me about the last time..."), not the future ("would you...").
- Run the interviews without mentioning your idea until you've understood their actual situation.
- Immediately after each interview, write one sentence: what did I hear that I didn't expect?
What you'll need
A first-pass list of who you think has this problem, and roughly why you believe that.
Who it's for
Founders about to run their first — or next — round of customer interviews.
When to use it
Use before you contact anyone; the script is built to avoid leading questions.
When not to use it
Not for feedback on an already-shipped feature with existing paying customers.
What's included
A target-list worksheet, a ready-to-adapt interview script built around past behaviour rather than hypothetical future intent, and prompts for the follow-up "why" questions that get past a surface-level first answer.
- Customer Interview Planner (Markdown, AI-agent-ready) (markdown)
Completed example
Target list (for Shift Swap): 8 shift managers and 6 hourly workers at independent cafés and small retail shops the founder can reach locally.
Script excerpt: "Tell me about the last time a shift needed covering at short notice — what actually happened?" followed by "Why did you reach out to that person specifically?" and "What did you try before texting people individually?"
A filled note, immediately after one interview: "Didn't expect this — the manager had already tried a shared spreadsheet for shift swaps and abandoned it because nobody checked it. The pain isn't 'no way to swap shifts,' it's that nothing reliable exists to check."
Interpreting your result
A good interview produces specific, remembered detail — what actually happened, not a general opinion. If most of your notes read as opinions rather than described events, push the questions further into the past and present rather than trusting the answers as they are.
Log what surprised you in the Assumption and Evidence Tracker as you go, then score your evidence with the Evidence Analyser Tool once you've run enough interviews.
Licence
Single-purchaser licence covering personal and commercial use, including client work. Redistribution or resale of the template itself is not permitted.
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