Trying to speed up your startup growth may be slowing it down. If you’re focusing on quick fixes and not pattern-finding.

When my prospects say: “We have no time for this,” “We already know everything about our customers,” “We’ll just A/B test it,” or “Can you just write it?” — what I hear is: “We’re flying blind and kinda like it that way.”

(I have yet to work on a project where all of the research data lined up neatly with assumptions and guesses about conversion drivers for a specific target audience. Never ever has it happened — which is why we need the research phase in the first place.)