Case Study: Anthony and Form Theatricals
What progress are parents looking for when they hire theatre.
What progress might someone use theater for? I had never asked this question before, but Anthony Francavilla had. For the past few years, Anthony has been applying Customer Jobs principles to figure out the answers to that question. Theater has been around for thousands of years. Shouldn’t we know the reasons why people attend the theater? Maybe. But maybe not.
Anthony has managed and produced theater for ten years. In 2012, he cofounded Form Theatricals, whose mission is to help productions grow and be successful. This is particularly challenging in the theater world. Many productions are run by actors or writers who often don’t have much business experience. They also have little to no experience innovating around customer motivation. This is where Anthony and Form Theatricals come in.
Customer Jobs has helped Anthony figure out how to learn what really matters to theatergoers; what customers do and don’t consider as competition to theater; and how a theater production could improve its shows for patrons, increase profits from ticket sales, develop new types of theater products, and reduce the cost of operating a show.
Why look into Customer Jobs? Anthony knew that interviewing theater patrons was the key to improving a show. But what’s the best way to interview people about a show they’ve just seen? To find out, he sought advice from someone who specializes in interviewing customers. Anthony said,
I got together with this guy, Boris, who specializes in ethnographic interviewing. I said to him, “I have this problem with a client. People don’t like the show, but it’s selling well. I want to interview customers, but I don’t know what I should be asking them about.” He said I could talk to them and try to find out what Job these patrons are trying to get Done. He asked me if I had heard about Customer Jobs. I told him I hadn’t. He explained it to me. Then, he told me about some sources online where I could learn more. I also signed up for the Customer Jobs Meetup that’s run here in New York.
After looking into Customer Jobs a bit more and learning about some of the tools associated with the principles, it didn’t take long for Anthony to start gathering powerful insights.
Studying what customers consider as competition helps you reveal what pushes them to change. It also helps reveal their JTBD. Anthony applied some Customer Jobs thinking to his next client: a children’s theater company. To begin, he interviewed parents who had taken their children to the company’s show. He wanted to know why they chose this particular show. Did they consider any other activities for their children besides attending the theater? He told me, “We interviewed a bunch of parents. We learned that the options they had considered [as alternatives to attending the theater] ranged from going to The LEGO Movie and buying the LEGO video game to signing their children up to clubs — like the Girl Scouts.”
This was a story Anthony kept hearing. Parents were considering a wide array of options as alternatives to taking their children to this particular theater show. Or, in Customer Jobs terms, he learned exactly what parents considered as competition for their JTBD. These customers surely used the theater for other Jobs in other circumstances. But in this case, what Job were they hoping to get Done by bringing their children to this show?
To help him answer this question, Anthony applied Customer Jobs’s idea of “contrast reveals value.” He talked with these parents about what they did or didn’t like about the other options they had considered. What can the theater do for them that an alternative solution — such as the Girl Scouts — can’t? He also asked these parents about what they did immediately after the shows. Did they have family discussions about them? What were those discussions like? After talking with numerous parents, he began to see a distinct pattern. “We found out that part of the Job these parents are trying to get done — when it comes to entertainment and activities for their kids — was that they wanted help teaching their kids how to be independent…while also reinforcing that they are a member of a team.”
How do you go about making product changes when you understand the customers’ desire for progress? Anthony brought these insights to his client. Together, they decided to rewrite parts of the play. They kept most of the content the same, but they added a story arc wherein the hero works with the characters around him to solve a problem. This would give parents a talking point with their children about the importance of working with others. Anthony said,
It’s interesting to me because helping writers understand what Job parents are using their play for is more powerful than saying to them, “Write a movie, or write a play that a nine-year-old will like.” When we know that parents have a Job that involves their desire to teach their children life lessons in an entertaining way, we can work with our clients to help them craft their content better. When we present it as a Job to Be Done, the artist has a lot of leeway around what the story should do.
For Anthony’s client to sell more tickets to these parents, the performances had to help parents make progress against their JTBD, which included their aspiration to be responsible parents, as well as becoming better at teaching life lessons to their children. This needed to be done in a way that their kids would enjoy. The performance also had to do this better than what parents considered as competition — namely, other plays, movies, video games, and clubs.
Anthony wouldn’t have got the same depth of insight had he interviewed parents only about what they did and didn’t like about the play. Had he done that, he would have ended up getting a lot of feedback about how to make the play better — but only in comparison with other plays. With a Customer Jobs approach to understanding competition, he was now learning how theater compared with other solutions customers had tried.
What do we gain from digging deeper into the JTBD? Anthony wasn’t satisfied with just the one insight that these parents wanted help teaching their children life lessons. He wanted to dig deeper into their motivation. Were there other ways they were hoping that theater would make their lives better? He said,
One of the things we figured out was that parents want to have shared experiences with their kids. That’s not necessarily understood by the producers of theater and movies. On the surface, it doesn’t seem like a shared experience. Theater productions often see the dynamic of a play as “Let’s just go sit in a dark room and watch this together.” What we learned — and what a lot people don’t realize — is that the shared experience actually happens after the show. It’s when everyone goes out for dinner and they talk about the movie or the play they just saw.
This insight about shared experiences prompted Anthony to ask parents other questions. What were other shared experiences they engaged in with their children? How did theater fit into those?
I interviewed this father about how he, his wife, and his child would pick what they were going to watch on TV. They were basically engaged in rhetoric; they would each debate what they wanted to watch. They’d go back and forth, to the point that sometimes the debate would end with them all deciding to just go their separate ways and reading their own books. They wanted to have a shared experience — to the point that the debate itself became the shared experience — and they didn’t end up watching anything on TV.
By comparing and contrasting how families had and felt about shared experiences, Anthony could begin to understand what customers did and didn’t like about each solution. What made discussion about what to watch on TV so successful? What things didn’t families like about it? What were family discussions like after the family saw a play together? Were these discussions about life lessons or about other things, such as the performances of the actors? How could a theater show promote better conversations at home?
Answers to these questions helped Anthony understand that these parents wanted to make family life better through engaging and educational discussions with their children. These conversations were a bonding experience. This was exactly the kind of direction his client needed. It helped the children’s theater company make script adjustments so its plays could act as vehicles for family conversations.
How many Jobs might an innovation be used for? Anthony’s interviews with families had been successful. Understanding what Jobs they were using theater for helped him provide guidance for his client. He decided to continue Customer Jobs research with his other clients.
The next few shows he worked on were drama pieces with more serious subject matter — definitely not for kids. Patrons were usually individuals or small groups of friends. What Job might these people be using theater for? Anthony said,
We interviewed a banker who went to a show by himself. He said, “I love these weird off-off-Broadway plays.” As we dived deeper into what that meant, we began to realize that an important part of the theater experience was who else is in the audience. That’s what one group of customers was looking for. They would say, “I want to hang out with artists more.” Others would say, “It’s just amazing. I don’t normally sit in a room and have an experience with a group of diverse people like that.”
This is how Anthony began to discover another Job that people use theater for: it was about being a part of, or dipping their toes into, a different community. Very often, these customers had careers that weren’t arts related, such as banking or law. He would hear comments such as “I like these productions that are a bit out there,” “I like going because there are artists in the audience. They’re talking about art,” or “I don’t have a job in the arts, but I love the arts. I want to be involved in that kind of scene.” For many of these patrons, going to these shows was their only opportunity to engage with a diverse group of people. They liked the arts. They wanted to be involved in that community. Anthony said,
That was a very impactful insight. A lot of times, the theater will try to sell you the idea that it’s like a movie — but on stage. You can’t compete with that. Theater is more expensive. It’s sometimes super-inconvenient to attend a show. I have Netflix. If I want to watch a movie, I can hit a button, and there is a movie.
Figuring out what Job live entertainment solves for people in the twenty-first century is exciting. We’ve learned that, yes, it is entertainment, but it’s also about this idea of community. It’s something that you’re going to enjoy with other people. Maybe there will also be drinks, food, a lively atmosphere — all that kind of stuff. That’s something that a theater can take and use to build up a new business model for the twenty-first century — as opposed to this idea that there’s going to be a celebrity in the show. Tickets for those shows are two hundred and fifty dollars. There’s a very limited audience for that.
How can Customer Jobs help you reimagine existing products? With these new insights, Anthony and his clients were able to create a new type of theater experience: a theater subscription product. When people buy these subscriptions, each person is put into a specific cohort of customers. Shows are picked out for these customers. Over several months, this same group of people sees the same shows and engages in social events around the show. Anthony said,
These patrons valued this idea of inclusiveness. It is important for us to help theater productions understand that patrons are looking for an inclusive experience. This meant making the subscription affordable. It’s easier for a banker to pay five hundred dollars for a few shows than it is for many artists. We solved this problem by offering multiple payment options. You could spread the price over months or pay for the whole subscription up front.
How can Customer Jobs help you avoid wasting resources by building features that customers don’t care about? Anthony didn’t help his clients by only suggesting to them what they should add to a show. He also made suggestions on what to take out of it.
One of Anthony’s clients had a production that featured an after-the-show tour of the stage for anyone who attended. It was something the producers of the show were proud of. But did patrons enjoy it? As he interviewed patrons after the show, he learned that most of them hadn’t known about the tour when they bought their tickets. They had simply chosen the show because tickets were being sold at a discount. He said,
The majority of these patrons learned about the show and the discount on the day of the show. For some of them, it had been a last-minute decision. They’d be discussing with friends what to do for the evening. Should they just go to a bar? A comedy club? But when they noticed the discounted theater tickets, they then chose to buy tickets. It could be an hour or two before the show started.
Of all the people he interviewed, only one or two knew that the set tour was going to happen. Anthony’s client had assumed that theater patrons were interested in access to the actors and seeing how the show worked. As it happened, almost no one who bought a ticket knew about the tour. The tour hadn’t been part of these patrons’ purchase criteria, so it didn’t help explain why they were hiring the show. Anthony said,
We learned that people were not hiring the show to get access to the actors and set after the show. Finding that piece of information was very valuable. The after-show tour was expensive to maintain, and it wasn’t something patrons were particularly interested in. The Job for those patrons was about entertainment and having a shared experience with their friends and significant others.
In this case, the producers had overengineered the show. They had designed the show based on what they valued — a tour of the set — instead of what their customers valued — having a shared, fun experience with their friends. After gaining these insights, Anthony worked with the producers to discontinue the set tours. While experimentation is good, it has to be within the constraints of the Job that customers are hiring the show for. The new thinking freed up the show’s designers to focus on what they were doing right and make that better.
How does anxiety stop customers from buying your product? Is there really such a thing as an “impulse purchase”? Similar to tickets for airplanes, sporting events, and movies, theater tickets are worthless after the event starts. Seats are perishable inventory. This posed an interesting challenge for Anthony and his clients. To help him figure out how his clients could sell more tickets, he began interviewing customers to learn more about the key events that sped up or slowed down a decision to buy a ticket. Were there any anxieties about attending a particular show? If so, how could a theater production solve this problem? Anthony said,
For each customer, we mapped out a time line of the events that led up to their ticket purchase. We began to hear the same things over and over again. Things like, a husband reads a magazine with his friends at work — that’s where he’ll first find out about a play. He’ll e-mail his wife about it. She’ll respond with a comment like, “Seems interesting. I like that it’s a horror-themed play set in Spanish. I like horror.” But when bad reviews for it come out, they start to doubt if they’ll like it. But they still keep an eye on the show. Then, maybe a week later, they’ll learn about the discount. At that minute, they’re pushed over the edge and buy the tickets.
Anthony discovered two insights here: some anxieties prevent customers from buying tickets to a show, and tickets that seem to be impulse purchases sometimes aren’t.
The majority of customers who bought a ticket through a discount did so on the day of the show, but that doesn’t mean these were impulse purchases. In the backs of their minds, these customers already had specific shows they wanted to see. But what was holding them back from buying the tickets? Anxiety. They’d first be excited about a show’s concept, but if reviews weren’t positive, they’d hold off. The discount, however, could compress the purchase time line. It eased anxiety and caused potential patrons to buy.
Can Customer Jobs theory gather new insights about a medium that is thousands of years old? As the competition for theater changes with the advance of technology, it’s important to focus on the Jobs that customers hire theater for. Many parents use it as a way to help them have the types of conversations they want with their children and to help them teach life lessons. For those who want to expand and bring diversity to their social circles, community and diversity are critical.
Anthony’s application of JTBD principles and focusing on customer motivation have enabled him to innovate within a medium that is thousands of years old.
What’s the JTBD?
This case study reveals different directions of progress that people hope to make using theater. This would explain why there are so many different types of theater shows. Some big themes associated with Jobs to be Done I heard include: using shared experiences to create or strengthen bonds with family and friends, parents teaching their children life lessons, and adding excitement to into your social life by getting myself involved with people that you normally wouldn’t interact with.
The clearest JTBD I heard was related to parents’ struggles. They wanted to teach their children how to be independent, while also understanding how to work with others. This works for solutions such as video games, movies, clubs like the Girl Scouts, and attending the theater.
This case study had some great data about customer motivation; however, I still have questions about these parents’ motivations:
What are some of the consequences of not teaching their children life lessons?
Is there something in these parents’ lives that is pushing them to make a change now, or are they deciding to be proactive and avoid feeling guilty in the future?
Does having conversations about life lessons relate to anything else going in the lives of these parents or children? What about school or interactions with their friends?
What other solutions do parents couple with theater to make progress?
How will parents know their Job is Done? I.e. When do they know they are making progress and things are getting better?
I would have a to better idea of what progress parents are trying to make once I had answers to questions such as these.
Put it to work
How do you convince teammates or management to change a product? Frame design challenges as a JTBD. Innovators like to solve problems; we don’t like being told what to do. I find it’s best to motivate a team by presenting them with problems to solve in the form of a customer’s JTBD.
Dig deeper when you tap into a struggle or aspiration. How have customers tried to solve it before? Anthony discovered that parents had a desire for shared experiences with their kids. But what does shared experiences mean? It turns out that a shared experience is most important after the show. This insight gave Anthony the idea to talk with other patrons about their shared experiences. What made a shared experience successful? How had the patrons tried to have shared experiences?
When customers describe a struggle or aspiration, don’t make assumptions about what they mean; rather, unpack what they’re saying. Ask for specific examples. If they describe a struggle, how do they imagine life being better once they solve it? If they describe an aspiration, what are the consequences if they can’t achieve it? The answers will help you make design, marketing, and business decisions.
Discover what customers value. Learn their expectations at the moment of purchase and/or first use, and avoid overengineering solutions. Anthony had a client who offered a costly after-the-show tour of the set. However, he learned that almost no patrons were aware that the tour was being offered, so it didn’t affect their purchase decisions. This made it safe to remove tours from the show. This reduced costs of production, and it increased profits.
A great deal of waste happens when solutions are developed with features that customers don’t value. Customers value the progress a feature may deliver, not the feature itself.
If you have an existing product, engage in an audit to determine which features don’t help customers make progress toward their JTBD. If you’re about to create a new feature, make sure it delivers progress and, more importantly, helps you increase profits. You might learn just as one of Anthony’s clients did — namely, that you’re spending money to support features that customers don’t find valuable.
Determine if anxiety is a competitor. If it is, find ways of reducing it. You should attack the anxieties in choosing and using a product with the same fervor as attacking a competing product. If customers have anxiety over the cost-value relationship of your product, offer a discount. If customers experience anxiety in using your product, find a way to make your product less intimidating. Anthony attacked the former by offering discounts on the day of the show. He attacked the latter by offering drinks as “liquid courage” for theater patrons to feel more comfortable mingling with each other.
Be suspicious of the “impulse purchase” concept. No purchase is random. Anthony discovered that many customers purchased tickets on the day of — or even an hour or two before — the shows. But that doesn’t mean that these were impulse purchases. Many patrons had already decided they wanted to see a show; they had reservations about paying full price for a show that had received mixed reviews. A lowered price helped ease their anxiety about paying for a show that might not be very good.
Talk with customers about how they came to choose your product for their JTBD. They might claim that their purchase of a USB charging cable was “just an impulse purchase while I was waiting in line.” However, when you dig deeper, you might learn that they were about to go on a trip and wanted to take an inexpensive charging cable with them in case it got lost during their travels.
Learn more
This story is an excerpt from the book When Coffee and Kale Compete. You can download it as a free PDF, or buy it in paperback & kindle right here.
If you have more questions about Jobs to be Done, or want help applying JTBD concepts to your business or startup, contact me.
