Every product strategy begins with a clear picture of the customer. A target customer is the specific type of user or buyer the product is built to serve first, while a customer segment is a group of users or buyers with similar needs, constraints, and buying behavior. Naming this group sharply is what turns vague wishes into actionable decisions. When strategy says only "everyone," prioritization becomes impossible, messaging becomes unfocused, and design becomes a sea of compromises. A common mistake is trying to serve every segment at once, which produces a vague product that loses to focused competitors.
Beyond demographics, a jobs-to-be-done perspective asks what progress a customer is trying to make in a real situation. People do not "buy" software; they hire it to do a job, such as preparing a tax filing, onboarding a new hire, or coordinating a project review. Strategy should listen for the pain in that job. The more painful, frequent, and valuable the problem, the more likely users are to adopt and stay with a solution. Willingness to pay is a useful signal: it indicates that the product solves a meaningful problem in a valuable way for the target customer.
Customer discovery is the structured process of learning how customers behave, what they actually need, and how they solve the problem today, including with spreadsheets, internal tools, or sheer habit. A frequent mistake is asking leading questions that push users toward the answer the team already wants. Good discovery blends interviews, observation, and behavioral data. Importantly, teams should study all alternatives, not just direct competitors, because customers compare your product to whatever they use today, including doing nothing.