Feedback is essential for product managers to validate their assumptions, improve their features, and prioritize their roadmap. But how can you get feedback from users who are not early adopters, who may be less willing or able to share their opinions, needs, and pain points? Here are some tips to help you reach out to and learn from this segment of your user base.
Before you ask for feedback, you need to know who you are asking and why. Define your target users based on their characteristics, behaviors, goals, and challenges. Use data from your analytics, surveys, interviews, or other sources to segment your user base and identify the groups that are not early adopters. Early adopters are typically those who are more tech-savvy, curious, risk-tolerant, and vocal about their experiences. They may also have different needs and preferences than the majority of your users. Therefore, you need to focus on the users who represent your mainstream or future market, who may have different expectations, motivations, and barriers to adoption.
First, remember that products grow by retaining new users. New users aren't going to complain if your product sucks, they'll just leave. Second, become a new user yourself. Force yourself to go through your onboarding flow 10 times. Make yourself start from scratch - that's how you build new user empathy. Third, remember that your new users will change. In the beginning, you might have early adopters who are more tolerant for friction. Later on, you need to attract early or late majority users who will likely churn quickly if they can't get the magic moment right away. By all means, listen to your power users, but always strive to keep new user needs top of mind. Retaining new users = growth
Early adopters can be wonderful, especially when willing to provide candid feedback. And, by their nature, they are eager to put up with your offering's growing pains. However, previous experience has shown that early users are only part of your core audience. They are "risk takers" and might enjoy a bumpy ride. As you explore your personas, remember that most of your users want to solve their problems. Unless you break their JTBD, they will only offer insightful product feedback if you engage and motivate them as part of their onboarding. Ask them early and often to provide input and then make it easy.
In my experience User Groups can be one of the most valuable ways for any product manager or owner to get ongoing feedback and to shape products. To run successful user groups and maintain engagement it needs to be a two way value exchange with the users. Exposing future roadmap and shaping them, based on their input, can be a great way to demonstrate value. Feeling ownership of that can further boost their engagement! Finally providing market insights, trends and best practice are all value add for users too. If the users see value they will be willing to exchange that for their perspectives.
We’ve gone through this recently and the big challenge for me is the differentiation of needs between the customers you’re serving right now and the needs of the market you’re targeting. As product people, it can feel icky to ignore/refute feedback from our existing customer pool - after all, they’re the people who have helped us get to where we are today ?????????? But to grow (particularly in high-growth markets like SaaS), we must ruthless serve the customers we WANT, not just the ones we HAVE.
Define target users thoughtfully, recognizing diverse characteristics and needs. Focus on your mainstream or future market, as their perspectives unveil unique expectations and barriers. Precision in understanding users is key to innovation and sustained growth.
Once you have identified your target users, you need to find the best ways to reach out to them and incentivize them to provide feedback. Depending on your product type, stage, and goals, you may use different channels and methods, such as email, social media, in-app messages, phone calls, webinars, or user testing platforms. You may also offer different incentives, such as discounts, rewards, recognition, or access to exclusive features or content. The key is to make your feedback request clear, relevant, timely, and valuable for your users. You want to show them that you care about their opinions and that you are willing to improve their experience.
As a product manager, getting feedback from disinterested users requires strategic thinking. Focus on their motivations - offer targeted incentives and anonymity to increase participation. Embed quick feedback channels in places they already frequent. Frame it as helping improve the product for them and others. Politely follow up if initial response is low. Keep it short and easy - a few key questions or simple ratings. Analyze your audience and tailor approaches to segments most likely to provide useful insights.Persist politely without being pushy. Show you listen by highlighting action taken based on their feedback. With some creativity and persistence, you can gain valuable insights even from reluctant users.
Different user groups needs tailored strategy and channels to reach them. For instance, gaming companies might find success targeting users within similar genres through in-game advertisements or on platforms like Discord, where gamers gather to discuss and share experiences. These users might be more receptive to free or discounted in-game purchases. Health insurance companies, on the other hand, may need to adopt a more traditional approach, focusing on reaching older adults who may be hesitant to engage with technology. In-person recommendations from case managers or personal physicians may prove more effective in this case. Choosing the right channel can significantly impact a company's bottom line, saving both time and resources.
Choose diverse channels wisely – email, social media, in-app messages, webinars – tailored to your audience. Incentivize with discounts, recognition, or exclusive access. The art lies in making feedback requests clear, timely, and valuable. It's not just about data; it's about building a user-centric community.
The "later" adopters tend to be comfortable with their existing solutions so find them in the media where existing solutions are marketed. They also need strong motivation to switch, so the new product/service will need to be positioned as having a significant improvement over existing solutions to attract them to even bother to assess and give feedback on alternatives.
To engage non-early adopters for feedback: Select Effective Channels: Choose communication methods most frequented by your target users, be it email, social media, or in-app messages. Offer Incentives: Motivate feedback with incentives like discounts or exclusive access, making participation more appealing. Feedback Relevance: Ensure your feedback requests are directly relevant to their user experience. Value Their Input: Communicate clearly that their feedback is crucial and will be used to enhance their experience. For example, if your user data indicates a segment often uses a specific feature, reach out through that channel with a relevant incentive. It’s about showing users that their feedback is valued and impactful.
The quality of your feedback is largely dependent on the quality of your questions and your listening skills. To get the most out of user feedback, it’s important to ask open-ended questions that will encourage users to share their thoughts, feelings, and actions related to your product. Avoid leading, biased, or vague questions that may influence or confuse users. Examples of good questions include: What is the main goal or problem you are trying to solve with our product? How do you use our product to achieve this goal? What do you like most and least about our product? How does it compare to other solutions? What features or improvements would you like to see? When asking these questions, it’s essential to listen actively and empathetically. Pay attention to their words, tone, body language, and emotions. Ask follow-up questions, clarify points, summarize key insights, and thank them for their feedback.
I recommend a story-based approach to customer interviews in many cases, consistent with the Jobs-to-be-Done framework. To gain often surprisingly deep insights, you want to uncover the story of how someone had the first thought that they needed to change their ways, and what they did after that, and after that, and after that, leading to the point where they learned about your product, decided to buy your product, and had their first experience with your product. Imagine in your customer interviews that you're going to be filming a documentary – the story of someone's life and how they discovered, purchased, and used your product. As a test, when you're finished with the IV, recite their experience like a tale from a book.
“If I had asked my customers what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse.” - Henry Ford A quote probably as over-used and misunderstood as any, but one that rattles around my head every time I speak with customers. Our aim shouldn't just be to give our customers what they ask for, but to help them solve problems. Ask questions that uncover an emotional need, collaborate on what solution might look like, then test. That's the value. ?? ABC examples ?? "What do you want to achieve?" = A (target) "What's currently stopping you?" = B (blocker) "Would something like this work?" = C (solution) "If C solved B, what would that mean for you?" "Did C help you achieve A, or what was missing?"
Unlock valuable insights from a diverse user base, not just early adopters. Craft thoughtful, open-ended questions that delve into their goals, product usage, likes, and dislikes. Your listening skills are key—pay attention to words, tone, and emotions. Quality feedback stems from quality questions and active, empathetic listening
One thing I've found helpful is leveraging funnels. Identify where is the user drop off in your product usage flow. Knowing the specific scenario would always help narrow down the feedback you are looking for? For example, instead of asking "what can we improve?" it's better to ask "We have observed that you are having the major challenge completing stage X, what is the major blocker at this stage?"
To gather valuable feedback from non-early adopters: Open-Ended Questions: Encourage detailed responses by asking questions that delve into their usage and opinions about your product. Avoid Leading Questions: Ensure your questions are unbiased and clear, allowing users to provide honest feedback. Active Listening: Pay close attention not just to what is said, but also to how it's said. Tone and expression can provide additional insights. Engagement in Conversation: Show genuine interest through follow-up questions and summarizing their points, reinforcing that their feedback is valued. Express Gratitude: Always thank them for their time and insights, fostering a positive relationship.
After you collect feedback from your users, you need to analyze and act on it. You need to sort, categorize, and prioritize your feedback based on its relevance, importance, and urgency. You also need to look for patterns, trends, gaps, and opportunities in your feedback. You may use tools such as spreadsheets, charts, graphs, or feedback management software to help you organize and visualize your feedback. The goal is to extract actionable insights and recommendations from your feedback that can help you improve your product and achieve your objectives.
During stakeholder interviews, I collaborated with them to create user personas based on their insights. As I gathered a collection of user personas, I began to identify patterns and trends that allowed me to define an ideal user profile. This process also revealed gaps in the product that I could address, often prompting further discussions with stakeholders who identified these shortcomings. By extracting insights and acting on feedback, I encouraged users to provide additional feedback, fostering a continuous loop of improvement.
After gathering feedback, dive deep into analysis. Categorize, prioritize, and uncover patterns to turn raw data into actionable strategies. Embrace tools for a visual journey. This systematic approach ensures your product evolves, meeting diverse user needs and propelling success.
In my experience with performing lot of user researches, I've found it to be very helpful to validate the qualitative feedback you've collected with quantitative data. Some customers are exceptions or some times customers can ask for one thing but they really need another thing (reminds me of the classic Phillips Boombox story). So, it's a good idea to take qualitative feedback with a grain of salt. Validate it with quantitative data and then prioritize what to act on first. At the same time, beware of analysis paralysis. You don't want to be in a state of constant analyzing without taking action. Use your own judgement depending on the scenario and have a good tradeoff.
Would point out to let’s get inspired from the loops we built in our ML models, “RLHF”. Think on your product design to build in feedback loops. ????
After gathering user feedback: Organize Feedback: Sort and categorize feedback for easier analysis, prioritizing based on relevance and urgency. Identify Patterns: Look for common themes or recurring issues that can guide product improvements. Use Analytical Tools: Leverage spreadsheets, graphs, or specialized software to effectively analyze the data. Extract Actionable Insights: Focus on extracting practical steps from the feedback to enhance your product. Implement Changes: Put these insights into action, ensuring that the feedback leads to tangible improvements. This approach ensures feedback is not just collected but actively used to drive product development and user satisfaction.
The last step is to communicate your feedback results and outcomes to your users and stakeholders. You want to show them that you value their feedback and that you have taken it into account. You also want to show them how their feedback has influenced your product decisions and actions. You may use channels such as email, blog, newsletter, social media, or in-app notifications to share your feedback findings, updates, and achievements. You may also ask for more feedback or invite your users to test your new or improved features. The goal is to build trust, loyalty, and engagement with your users and stakeholders, and to foster a culture of continuous feedback and learning.
After collecting diverse feedback, the final step is crucial – transparently communicate the results and the positive impact on your product. It's not just about sharing data; it's about building trust, loyalty, and fostering a culture of continual improvement.
When you've processed user feedback: Share Results: Use various channels like email, social media, or in-app notifications to communicate what you've learned from the feedback. Highlight Changes: Clearly show how user input has influenced product updates or future plans. Invite Ongoing Feedback: Encourage users to continue providing feedback, showing that it's an ongoing, valued process. Demonstrate Transparency: Open communication about feedback fosters trust and reinforces the value you place on user opinions. Foster Continuous Engagement: Use this as an opportunity to deepen user engagement and loyalty. By closing the feedback loop, you show users their voices matter and contribute to a dynamic, user-focused product evolution.
Engage non-early adopters through diverse channels like surveys, emails, or social media. Craft clear, concise questions focusing on their experiences rather than technical aspects. Offer incentives to encourage participation, ensuring anonymity to foster honest feedback. Utilize user-friendly platforms they're familiar with and highlight the impact of their input. Actively listen, acknowledge their opinions, and implement visible changes based on their feedback to build trust and encourage ongoing participation.
Try to leverage user activity data of your app. User behavior analytics goes beyond number crunching - get qualitative! ?? Traditional web tracking is limited to volumes and conversions. But modern tools unlock deeper insights like: - Session recordings - Mouse movement heatmaps - Form submission workflows - Customer journey mapping With qualitative behavior data, you can: - Identify usability issues - Improve journeys - Personalize experiences - Drive loyalty
Engaging non-early adopters for feedback requires empathy, tailored approaches, and a keen understanding of diverse user needs. Let's redefine feedback strategies to ensure our products resonate with a broader audience
These principles should work if you want to seek feedback from early adopters Reach -->Identifying the cohort that would be valuable but reluctant is very important step. You may want to tailor personalized messaging to garner interest of small group of people. React --> Once you get successful in reaching them and garnering some interest , communicating couple of the most important features to them that would prone them to react and give feedback would be then next step. If this can be personalized to a certain extent, that would be great Respond --> Making sure that you timely and purposefully respond to their questions, suggestions , concerns is the utmost important step to make sure that they get aligned with your product journeys
To gather feedback from non-early adopters, explore diverse channels like customer support interactions, surveys, or targeted outreach. For instance, a company launching a new mobile app can leverage customer support data to identify common issues faced by non-early adopters. Conducting user surveys specifically targeting this user segment allows collecting their opinions, preferences, and pain points. Engaging them through focus groups or beta testing tailored for a broader audience also garners valuable insights. This diverse approach ensures inclusive feedback, capturing perspectives beyond the tech-savvy early adopters.
This is a complicated challenge, especially for start-ups. The real magic happens not just in collecting data but in turning it into actionable insights and translating them into impactful product developments. Communication is the linchpin—transparently sharing how user feedback steers product in the right direction and fosters enduring trust and engagement among the team.