What is feature request voting and should you use it?

Do you want to read your customer’s minds to deliver a valuable product for them? Are you aware of which customers need which type of features? Feature voting is the ultimate solution for your answers. The concept of customers voting for their ideas or features on your product roadmap or an idea board is often termed feature voting or in other words, products or roadmap voting. 

 Customers may input ideas, requests, and features through a customer portal. If people want a feature that has already been urged, they upvote it instead of creating a new one. This method is easier and more scalable for pooling user opinions, ideas, and proposals than conventional methods of communication. 

How does feature voting help?

Feature voting is a powerful technique used to keep your customers engaged with your product. Here are some points on how this helps you: 

• In providing a centralized system for customers to leave feedback that will help you enhance your product.

• To determine which input is ideal for your product and vision based on the individual who gave you the feedback and a variety of other factors.

• When you begin working on the features, change the status of feedback to "In-progress". It helps to convey to your customers that you are working as per their voting.

Why should you use feature voting?

 Customers demand features to invest in a product. Feature voting allows you to collect feature requests and make consumers vote on features so that you know exactly what to create, and when to build it, so that you will know how your customers will react. The following are the reasons why you should use a feature voting process for your products:

1. To understand your customer’s needs:

Customer satisfaction is the result every company desires. You can make your product more valuable by inculcating features that your customers exactly wish to attain. 

2. To know which customers require which features:

Have an eye on which customers are voting for which features through which you can target the right customers for your products. If you have more than one customer segment or persona, check for the importance of each segment and make product decisions based on the prioritized segment. 

3. Take the guesswork out of choosing features and roadmaps: 

Maintain an up-to-date list of your most often voted features. One of the data inputs for your prioritized product must be the number of upvotes. Combine this information with other factors such as the time it took to build the feature, its strategic value, etc., to build a successful product.

4. Create data-driven decisions about your product roadmap:

Keep your backlog organized by collecting all of your feature requests in one place, along with the details of the number and which customers have voted for each feature. You can decide about your product features based on these data. 

5. To attract your audience to your product: 

When you launch something that your customers have requested, let them know. People will get connected with your product more when they find that you have included their upvoted features. This makes them both listened to and valued. In the end, happy customers matter a lot while expanding your business. Use this feature voting to know more about customers' needs and create a valuable product for them.

Things to consider while using the Feature voting tool

As human beings, people may respond reactively to other requests, not allowing them to show their original ideas. This can be avoided by first-mover bias where people can view poll results only after making their pick.

Also, customers will not be aware of what they actually want and end up making inappropriate choices. That's why it's essential for businesses to be able to match the outcomes of tools like feature voting with the founders' product vision.

Best Feature Voting tools for Product Managers

1. Zeda.io:

Zeda.io is the feedback management tool where its feedback dashboard allows you to view and track all of your collected feedback and feature requests. 

Pros

• Product managers at SaaS companies using Zeda.io are in charge of all product functionality decisions.

Cons

• Some product managers may find this function complicated since it takes them away from their core responsibilities.

2. Convas

Convas, a consumer feedback management tool helps businesses in determining which features are most important to their customers, as well as which customers are concerned about which features. It’s available at a fixed plan of $49/month.

Pros:

• Feature voting allows you to directly communicate with your customers to make better product decisions. 
• It's simple to set up, however, it's lacking in features, especially the feedback widget.

Cons:

• This tool is slightly expensive, hence this does not apply to small-scale businesses.

3. Product board

Product board is  a product management tool that assists you in determining what consumers want, prioritizing what to build next, and rallying everyone behind the roadmap. Product board's monthly fees start at $25/per user.

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Pros:

• With product board you can also collect user feature requests and organize them into a prioritized roadmap based on feature upvotes.

Cons:

• Product Board limits each membership based on the number of visitors and editors. Thus, making your monthly fees rise to hundreds of dollars quickly.

• Most consumers find the pricing to be complex and vague, making it difficult for them to control their costs. 

4. UserVoice

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Specially designed for businesses who want to collect consumer feedback and handle support queries. The quote starts at $500/month but to get a detailed quotation, you should contact the sales department. 

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Pros:

• Customers can express their ideas and vote on feature request voting boards created by companies using UserVoice similar to other tools. 

• It offers a more advanced version of feedback software for organizing and storing customer input, and it's well-suited to large businesses when it comes to reporting.

Cons: 

• It’s quite expensive and a little complicated to use. 

• Their prices are not readily available which takes up the company's time to know the exact pricing.

5. ProdPad

Prodpad helps product managers to collect feature requests from users and upvote features on a feature voting board. It's slightly at the costlier end. The price ranges from $149 to $1299.

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Pros:

• The timeline view, which highlights the most recent product announcements, facilitates the creation of a well-organized plan for several items.

Cons:

• Customization issues, particularly in areas unrelated to your business.

• External tools are required to effectively leverage the client feedback feature.

• Difficulty in navigating between designs.

6. Canny

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Canny, a feature management tool assists businesses in collecting, prioritizing, and tracking customer inputs. Canny is priced at $50 per month. The free plan only offers a few basic functions, you'll have to pay $200 a month to get more benefits. 

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Pros:

• Determines which features your clients want to assist your company team in making smart product decisions.

• The more options available at premium costs makes it easier for large-scale businesses for their smooth operation.

Cons:

• Canny emphasizes a single object, "the features," and forces users to design their own solutions.

• Overall, more businesses are becoming dissatisfied with Canny's "per voter" price. For businesses with a high number of users or those that use a subscription model, there is a higher chance to quickly pile up their expenses.

Feature Voting Best practices

A Feature voting system helps by asking inquiries, gathering information, and testing your solution ideas. Customers may have various ideas about your product. The feature page is a wonderful method to guide you to figure out further specifics through a customer interview.

If you're not in a position to implement a feature that got a large number of votes, make sure you intimate your customers about the proper reason for not proceeding with the requested feature. It helps you to be straightforward and open to your customers. 

Conclusion

Is it a risky endeavor to use feature voting? No. 

It's always beneficial to take a quick peek at what's going on in your product or app and present it to the buyers. This way, users can review features, integrations, navigation, and other aspects of the product. 

By using feature voting software, you may identify what your consumers want to see next and enhance the overall user experience. It's a quick and economical technique to explore a concept and get feedback from customers.

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