The Mom Test is a good book for those looking to build their own startup. In the book, Rob Fitzpatrick teaches you how to validate your idea with customer interview. One of the key things during the customer interview process is taking good notes.

Some of the thing he recommends to include in the notes are:

  1. When possible, write down exact quotes. Wrap them in quotation marks so you know it’s verbatism. You can later use them in your marketing language and other stuff.

  2. Add symbols to your notes as context. Someone saying “that’s a problem” can be interpreted differently on whether they are neutral or angry. Any strong emotion is worth writing down. Some symbols are
    • 😀 Excited
    • 😡 Angry
    • 😳 Embarrased
    • ⚡ Problem
  3. He also suggested that customer notes should be:
    • Easily sorted, mixed and rearranged.
    • Combine with other notes.
    • Permanent and retrievable.

You can follow his way of taking note or you can even roll out your own way. But the important thing is to keep a note that you always want to look at.

If you are interested on reading “The Mom Test”(which you should!), you can find it here.

If you do want to follow his way of taking note, Fluorite is an Android and iOS app that is design just for that!