POVs
A POV is a person you bring in to look at your work. Where they come from decides how much their reaction is worth.
A POV has a name, a role and a way of reading things: Sarah · Customer, Alex · Skeptic, Tom · Power user. They look at your work the way that person would, and they keep their view unless the work changes it. Every POV says where it comes from, so you always know what a reaction is worth.
Grounded in your customers
Bring your own customer evidence and povs shapes the POV from it:
- Reviews
- Interviews
- Sales calls
- Surveys
- Support conversations
A grounded POV shows what it’s grounded in (for example, 1,204 reviews and 23 interviews), what that evidence covers well and where it’s thin. Sarah might be strong on price and trust and thin on onboarding: listen to her about pricing, and weigh what she says about onboarding accordingly.
Nothing changes a POV until you approve it.
Created from your brief
Describe someone in a sentence or two, like “a skeptic who cancelled two coffee subscriptions last year and doesn’t believe a claim without proof”. povs works out the rest: what they check first, how they read, what puts them off. Use a brief for people you don’t have evidence for yet.
Fresh perspective
No context at all: someone seeing your work for the first time. The quickest way to find out whether it makes sense on its own.
Expert POVs
POVs that bring a specialist’s judgment. Later
Choosing POVs
| Where they come from | Best for |
|---|---|
| Your customers | Decisions about the people you already sell to: pricing, trust, messaging |
| A brief | Segments and objections you don’t have evidence for yet |
| Fresh | First impressions and clarity |
Different people notice different things, so most tests are better with two or three POVs than one. Then let them look.