5 Ways to Get User Feedback for Your Application

The best way to know what your consumers think about your product or service is by collecting user feedback directly from them. So whether you are designing a new product or improving an old one, understanding the user perspective is one of the easiest and most efficient ways to achieve success for your application. The goal of the entire process is simple: know what users like and dislike about the application and use the data to evaluate how to make your application better.

What Is User Feedback?

User feedback can be defined as quantitative and qualitative data from consumers on their first impressions, dislikes, likes, and requests about a product or service. There are typically two types of customer feedback:

Proactive User Feedback: The data is solicited directly from the users. Reactive User Feedback: Users send you the feedback unprompted.

During the application development stage, product teams analyze the performance of an application based on bug reports, support requests, and suggestions from the user experience of professionals and common people. This data is merely collected using channels like emails, live chat, product surveys, customer support, and app feedback. After collecting data, software engineers use user feedback tools to improve the customer experience for the future.

Why Is User Feedback Important?

Helps in understanding the needs of your customers. Allows you to benchmark the performance of your application. Provides you with the best insight, which helps in improving products. Gets you testimonials, reviews, and referrals. Helps you interact with your customers directly.

Collecting User Feedback 101 | How to Collect User Feedback?

From the early stages of product development to finalizing the UX design and functioning of your app, collecting user feedback and acting upon it plays a crucial role in the success of your app. Here are the top five expert-advised ways to gather feedback for your application:

Request for Quantitative and Qualitative Feedback at Every Stage

We recommend collecting feedback at both stages, while your app is in the prototyping stage and after it is released. However, the user feedback tools and approaches that you use for each scenario will be different:

Collecting User Feedback During the Prototyping Stage: During an agile sprint review meeting, invite people who represent your target audience and ask them questions such as: What parts of the app did you like the best and why? What do you think of the UX design (interface)? What parts of the app did you like the least and why? Will you keep using the app in the future?

Collecting User Feedback Every Day After Product Release: When asking users for their valuable feedback, timing is everything. An app feedback pop-up request shouldn’t prevent consumers from achieving their goals. Instead, find a natural point in their journey, like when a user reaches a milestone, program an automatic real-time feedback collector at this point.

Organize Surveys

Surveys are one of the simplest and most effective ways of collecting user feedback. They allow users to let the developers know what is working and what’s not and how to improve the customer experience. Therefore, when creating a survey, ensure to incorporate open-ended questions which give users the freedom to share their views. Once you have the data, use user feedback tools like “Net Promoter Score (NPS)” to categorize the reviews into promoters (highly recommended), neutrals, and detractors (not recommended). The NPS system comprises a single question: “How likely are you to recommend our product from 0 to 10.” This will help you understand whether consumers will promote your app and, if not, what is holding them back.

Pro Tip: Send surveys via email to users every six months.

Work On Your Observation Skills

Even though mastering observation skills is time-consuming, it’s worth it. One of the most common mistakes that product managers make during the testing stage is relying only on self-reported data. While consumers won’t intend to lie, there is a high chance that they will only remember the good features of the app when filling out a survey. Therefore, to know the real problems, keenly observe and analyze consumers while they test the app. Keep an eye on their facial expressions and send members of the product teams if you feel like they require assistance.

Establish Forums

Another way to interact with users in real-time and collect their feedback is by establishing or monitoring online forums where users can ask for help whenever they face a hurdle. This will improve your customer experience and give you a chance about user expectations. However, note that most feedback will be negative as people who face problems are more likely to post about them than those who don’t. And because social media is open to all, have a brave heart when responding to criticizing reviews.

Incorporate On-Site or In-App Feedback

On-site or in-app feedback refers to asking users questions while interacting with your app. These pop-ups can be scheduled in different instances, such as when the user signs in or out. Know that these types of feedback can include a simple star, a 0 to 1 rating mechanism, or a one-line question. Both user-triggered and system-triggered feedback gives you an idea of what the customer is experiencing while using a particular feature.

User Feedback is a Key Component of Application Success

Living in a customer-centric world, collecting user feedback is no longer optional. Needless to say, this is because the success of your product or service lies in your commitment to stay as close to users as possible. So, to lead your company to success, try interacting with your consumers, understand them and develop an app they need. At the end of the day, just remember that regardless of the type of product you create, customer satisfaction should be your number one priority.