There are many approaches and methodologies for collecting user feedback. In an ideal world, the why, how, and where of your feedback-gathering approach should be part of a broader Voice of the Customer (VoC) program, but it’s okay to start small. Here are a few tactics you can leverage to engage with your users:
In-app messaging / surveys: As the name implies, these requests for feedback are deployed within your application. Asking for your users’ feedback while they’re actually using your product means you’re capturing their real-time, contextual sentiment. This is a great way to field rating scale-type questions (more on that below).
Pulse surveys: Brief, periodic surveys sent to your users or a subset of users. Pulse surveys can be deployed via email, social media, or any other platforms your users utilize regularly. The beauty of pulse surveys is that they allow you to track sentiment over time, at consistent intervals. Try to have at least one quantitative measure as part of your pulse survey so you can easily spot trends and fluctuations.
User testing: There is an entire school of thought on user testing approaches. But when it comes to your product, it can be incredibly valuable to simply observe a user interacting with it. You’ll quickly get a sense of which areas of your product are intuitive vs. not, and you’ll witness first-hand where your users are getting stuck vs. where they’re good to go. The lesson also applies to software you’ve purchased for your teams to use. Getting a good sense of pain points and blockers will help optimize the onboarding process and limit the friction employees experience within and across apps.
User interviews: Conducting one-on-one interviews with your users allows you to capture their candid, unfiltered feedback at the individual level. While interviews are generally labor and time-intensive, they can be a valuable source of qualitative feedback (and verbatim quotes) that might otherwise get lost when data is evaluated in aggregate.
Focus groups: Focus groups allow you to bring a smaller cohort of users together for an open discussion about their experiences with your product. While they can also be an insightful source of qualitative feedback, be wary of groupthink and how it may sway the discussion or color your users’ sentiment.
Feedback capture and prioritization tool: Having a dedicated place on your website or within your product where people can voluntarily submit feedback and product requests is a great way to show your users that they’re at the heart of your product. And for product owners, it’s a great way to manage all that incoming feedback in a single place—ultimately empowering you to make informed decisions. Check out how Pendo Feedback does it here. Taking a similar approach for your employees empowers you to make the right choices to optimize their experience while letting your team know their thoughts and concerns aren’t going unaddressed.