Product feedback guidelines & how to write a good feedback post

Your feedback is very welcome

WoodWing has a comprehensive software platform used by thousands of organizations worldwide. That means we receive a lot of valuable feedback and suggestions.

Your comments and votes on suggestions help us understand what you’re passionate about and how you want our products to support you and your team. The most helpful information you can provide us when commenting on issues is how a particular suggestion would help you. If you describe your use-case to us, and how the suggested change would benefit you and your team, it lets us gain a much deeper understanding of the need behind the suggestion.

Suggestions often have an impact on what we work on, even if we ultimately choose not to implement a suggestion exactly as it’s described. Our ultimate goal is to understand what you and all of our customers need and to create products that meet those needs. Occasionally, that’ll mean implementing a suggestion as described, but it usually means working to understand the need behind the suggestion and how we can meet that need for as many users as possible.

While we endeavor to update and respond to popular suggestions, the volume we receive means there will often be occasions when we can’t provide an update or response. Unfortunately, we cannot follow through on every suggestion and we need to say ‘no’ more than we would like to.

We do want to be transparent about the process of how we handle your feature ideas.

You have an idea - How to submit that idea to WoodWing

• While you can submit your idea directly on the feature idea forum, there is certain information that will help speed up the process for evaluation.
• Requested information (Mandatory)

  • Reach

    • How many people are looking for this feature?
    • Voting is not necessarily the best way to see interest in a particular post. We cannot discern if partners are requesting features for 1 company or 100 companies. The more you can tell us about who wants the feature and what companies you are representing, the better.
    • Types of questions to answer
      • If this feature was picked up in the next six months, how many people would use it?
      • Is this functionality beneficial to only one or two power users? Is it everyone at one company?
      • Are there multiple companies that want this?
      • How often do you perform this task?
      • How much time / money does this cost your business?
    • Leaving a comment that “all our users want this” can be misinterpreted or vague. Does that mean all of the users at a partner company? All of the users in a current project? The more data and numbers we have, the better your odds are that something will move forward. Help us understand the request and why it’s crucial.
  • Impact
    • Help us understand how the feature would impact the party requesting the feature.
    • Types of questions to answer
      • How would this feature change the way users work?
      • Is this something that would save one person a couple of minutes the first time they use WoodWing?
      • Is this something that would save hours for every user who uses WoodWing software?
      • How much time / money would be gained by having this functionality?
      • Is this something that a new customer would sign up for WoodWing in the next 6 months because of this feature?
  • User Stories
    • Help us understand the challenge. The fewer details provided, the more assumptions will be made. Our understanding of the situation and priority may be different than the person providing the feedback.
    • This may seem obvious, but walk us through what you are doing today and why it’s a problem. The more details you can give us in a step by step breakdown, the better. There is more than one solution to a problem, and we might have some ideas of other ways to solve challenges rather than being told we have developed something exactly as described.
  • Confidence
    • How confident are you that this feature would solve your problem
    • Example: I want to be able to auto generate pdfs from Digital Editor. How confident are you that if this feature was picked, it would;
      • A) be used
      • B) make the user happy
      • C) Save time in the way described in the user story
    • Questions to answer
      • If you could only have one feature per year added to WoodWing software, would it be this?
      • If you could have this feature available tomorrow, but had to pay 2,000 euros for it, would you buy it?
  • Ensure all the details about the feature are included. Provide examples or use cases to demonstrate the need for the feature.
  • Customer Success Manager if you have one assigned.

Initial triage reviews the post

• Our Customer Impact Group will respond to the posts. An initial response may be given to let you know the post is seen and to tease out any missing information. Once the necessary information has been submitted, the post may be escalated to Product Team for evaluation
• Note that we also have a lot of talented partners in our system. They often have additional ideas and suggestions that may also appear on your post. While the partners may suggest various solutions or integrations, WoodWing is not responsible for any privately created integrations or solutions.

Product Manager reviews the post

• The Product Manager may reach out on the post or directly via email. They may submit any questions they may have.
• The Product Team will be responsible for considering several factors that are not visible on the forums. Please know that the following items are being considered.
  • Product strategy - ideas need to be aligned with our long-term strategic vision.
  • Demand - are there other customers who proposed the idea or would benefit from similar functionality?
  • Level of effort - simple ideas have shorter implementation time than complex features.
  • Availability of our team and resources.
• One of four things will happen when a Product Manager or Customer Success representative responds.
  • Development has evaluated your request and decided that they will not develop the feature at present. We will respond with a clear “No”.
    • If your request falls into this category, we are very sorry that we can’t accommodate your request, and we will assist you in finding alternatives if possible.
  • Your feature request doesn’t currently fit in the Roadmap, but it may in the future. We will respond “This is not on the roadmap for the next year”.
    • If your request falls into this category we will enter your submission in the feature request backlog where it waits until we can schedule it for development. Depending on the nature of the request, the feature may only sit in the backlog for a short term period and then long term. If the feature requires significant changes to our current codebase or our developers need to make other changes first, the feature will have to wait an unspecified time before implementation.
  • Your feature request is a candidate to be developed and submitted as a “Hot Topic” within the Early Access Program. Early Access posts will be moderated and ranked against other features.
    • If your request falls into this category, we are looking to validate that this request is the highest priority for all of our customers. We have a limited bandwidth for new features and would like to prioritize what matches our product vision against the consensus of our customers.
  • Development is developing or has developed your feature request. “We will respond that the feature has been picked up”
    • If your request falls into this category, Your request hit the fast track to development, and your feature request is now available or will be shortly.
• How do I know what the Product Managers will pick up for hot topics and the roadmap?
  • There are many factors that influence our product roadmaps and determine the features we implement. When making decisions about what to prioritize and work on, we combine your feedback and suggestions with insights from our support teams, product analytics, research findings, and more. This information, combined with our medium- and long-term product and platform vision, determines what we implement and its priority order.

Early Access - Evaluation

• Hot Topics
  • Your feature request is selected as a candidate for development and submitted as a “Hot Topic” within the Early Access Program. Early Access posts will be moderated and ranked against other features. For rules on the early access program, please see this policy.

Early Access - Development

• Upcoming
  • Our Upcoming web page lists the roadmap as it is currently planned. Keep an eye on this page here for Studio and this page here for Assets to see if your feature is up next.
  • Roadmap is subject to change
• Prototypes
  • To avoid cognitive bias, we will be performing prototype tests as much as possible. This will help us to remove assumptions on new features being introduced in our software. If you would like to participate in prototype tests, please feel free to sign-up in the Early Access Forum.

Release

• Release notes
  • We're continuously improving and updating our Cloud products. To see the latest changes, take a look at WoodWing’s release notes.
  • For a summary of changes, see the release notes for your product on the Help Center
• Forum Posts
  • When applicable, we will update the original feedback forums post with information that the feature has been released.

Rules

1. We are making decisions based on vision, priority and most importantly data. Gut-feelings need to be backed up with measurable data. If there is no data, we will assume the worst possible value for your request.
2. Both WoodWing and Users on the forums agree to conduct themselves in professional conduct. Gaslighting, manipulation tactics, and misdirected anger at WoodWing will not be tolerated on the forums. This is a professional work environment and berating employees or products will not be tolerated. Failure to comply will result in removing access from the forums.
3. Timelines will not be given. We know and understand that you want features delivered yesterday. However, developers need time to research, build and implement code in a way that will positively impact users. Demanding timelines or immediate responses will only lead frustration on both sides.
4. By submitting a feature request on the forums, you accept that this feature may never be picked up. We endeavor to pick up features from customers and partners, but please understand that it could be years before we pick up a very valid well written post.
5. Submitting feature requests on the forums is entirely up to your discretion. We will do our best to respond and move requests through the process. However, your participation in this process is entirely voluntary. However, if you would like to see something picked up in the future, we will ask you to follow the rules.