What happens with feedback
Gathering useful timely feedback is a challenge. One we’ve addressed quite well with Intercom. But when you get all that feedback, what do you do with it? Let’s face it, we’re all sick to death of receiving vague emails saying “Thanks, we’ll certainly consider this someday“, only to never hear anything again. I often wonder if app owners ever do anything with the feedback they get. Are they trying to improve their product with the survey , or is it just all just a façade to look busy.
The balancing act
As an app owner, reading user feedback is difficult. On one hand you have to be willing to keep the faith and deliver on your vision. On the other hand, if eleven people out of twelve are telling you they need image cropping, then it’s possible your vision has a blind spot.
You have to be ready
Don’t bother soliciting feedback unless you’re in a position to act on it. If you’re not ready to start coding or designing, then you’re not in a position to act. It might seem constructive to run surveys asking what your users want, but if their only purpose is to make you feel busy then you’re fooling everyone. Feedback has to result in action. That action is design, implementation, and communication back to the user. Turning the feedback into a to-do list with no one responsible, or a putting it on a whiteboard of “stuff to do someday, maybe” is the equivalent of saying “Yeah, whatever” to your users. They won’t be keen to talk you again.
You have to be open
If you only ever implement feedback that you agree with, you probably don’t need the feedback in the first place. For feedback to be useful, you must at least consider implementing changes you don’t agree with. The whole idea is to solicit opinions that you didn’t come up with yourself, how else will you discover your blind spots.
A simple test to see if you’re open to feedback is this. If lots of feedback asks for a feature or change you strongly disagree with, will you discard it, or will you explore your options. If it’s the former, you’re not open minded, you just like playing with Wufoo.
Ask the right questions in the right way
I wrote a post all about asking for feedback a year ago, and also recently about saying the right things at the right time. There is a right time, location, medium, and tone for soliciting types of feedback.
Before you go run surveys for fun, always remember that you’re spending your customers’ precious time. Is it worth it? Are you ready to act on it? Are you open to what it could say? Are you asking the right questions in the right way? A good survey is a great way to remind your users you care and want to do better for them. A bad one is a great way to show them you don’t value their time or opinions. Your call.
Discuss this post on Hacker News. Follow destraynor and contrast on twitter, always use Intercom for all your feedback. Top image makedonche19.