As a Product Manager, feedback from users is a valuable gift. During product development, feedback is used to validate that we’re on the right track, building the right things, or to make needed adjustments before we’ve gone too far down the wrong path. Ideally users are involved before we even begin development, through user interviews and providing feedback on wireframes and prototypes. After a product has launched, we study usage metrics and ask users for even more feedback with surveys in the app and via email.
The source of all this feedback is the agent. We try to be mindful of how much we ask agents for but recognize that we ask for feedback a lot. Every time agents provide feedback on a product, it helps make it better.
One thing that may not be clear is the actual impact that feedback has on a product. Often it may seem like shouting into the void, when they aren’t able to see the immediate impact and it may leave them wondering, is anyone actually listening? Here’s a peek behind the curtain at what is actually happening with all that feedback.
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- You’ve suggested a really great feature idea or improvement that is totally aligned with the overall product vision. Even the best suggestions we receive from agents take time for us to make sure we understand – why is the agent asking for this functionality and what is the best way we can incorporate it into the product? We want to avoid becoming a feature factory, pumping out new features without taking the time to understand their purpose and be sure they are implemented correctly. When we are too reactive to feedback and try to fulfill every request, it can lead to a bloated product that doesn’t perform well and is confusing to use. This means that one of the best places for you to see the influence of your feedback is actually on the product roadmap and not in the product itself, especially for major changes or large features.
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- We receive awesome ideas for features that end up in our product backlogs but don’t get prioritized because while they sound interesting and valuable, they may just not be a great fit for the product or be too costly to implement. We’re constantly looking at the feedback and data we’re receiving to set the priorities for the product. Part of that is weighing the complexity and cost of implementing a feature against the impact that it will have for all of our users.
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- When you provide feedback about an issue you’ve experienced in a product, we investigate to recreate that issue and figure out what caused it so that we can fix it. If you’ve provided feedback that something isn’t working right, but you haven’t included details like what you were doing in the application when the issue occurred, what error messaging you saw, what steps you took before and after the issue there may not be enough information for us to figure it out. Be sure that if you are reporting feedback that includes an issue you provide enough detail for us to take action to correct it.
Building our products with input from users helps make sure that they do what you need and that you’ll have a good experience while using them. We want to hear from you!
