Customer Feedback Management Guide (+ Best Tools)

Building a product that truly clicks with your users starts with listening to them. That's why customer feedback management is crucial for nailing product-market fit.

In this guide, I'll walk you through each critical step, from collecting, analyzing, acting on, and responding to feedback to covering the channels and tools that bring you success.

Let's jump right into it. 👇

What is customer feedback management?

Customer feedback management (CFM) is a structured approach to collecting, analyzing, acting on, and responding to customer feedback to improve their experience and your product.

It's the complete circle of customer feedback. From listening to your users to implementing their requests and closing the loop.

Usually, this means having a strong customer feedback system that helps organize and track this process.

Why is customer feedback management important?

Customer feedback management is key to reducing churn, improving your products and services, and boosting revenue. It strengthens customer relationships, which in turn creates a stronger brand.

Over 96% of customers would leave a business because of bad customer service. That's a staggering number!

It's crucial to have a solid feedback management system to provide the level of customer service that's expected.

To make it even sweeter, customers who have positive experiences are likely to spend 140% more. This alone should motivate any company to create the best possible experience for their customers.

Customer feedback management helps you:

• Prioritize & populate your product roadmap with customers' genuine needs
• Strengthen customer relationships and build loyalty
• Cut down churn
• Resolve issues proactively
• Show users their feedback is valued, which helps turn them into brand advocates and refer you to others.

In essence, customer feedback management isn't just a nice-to-have... It's a must-have for any business that values customer satisfaction, loyalty, and product-led growth.

Read more about the benefits of customer feedback →

How to manage customer feedback

Customer feedback management is a cyclic process that involves collecting, analyzing, implementing, and communicating users' feedback.

Let's break these down one by one.

1. Collecting customer feedback

To track feedback effectively, you should start by gathering all of it into one single place.

The problem is that you're likely getting it from many different channels, including emails, Intercom chats, Slack, etc.

That's where feedback tools can be real game changers. They give your users a dedicated place for requests. Feedback forums are also awesome for reducing duplicate ideas, as users already see existing ones.

And for feedback still coming from elsewhere, you can use native integrations to push them together with everything else.

Make sure to also include more quantitive feedback types, like customer satisfaction surveys. There are also loads of different ones, including Net Promoter Score (NPS), Customer Satisfaction (CSAT), and Customer Effort Score (CES).

Bonus points if your feedback tool already supports surveys.

Encourage feedback at multiple touchpoints in the customer journey to pinpoint bottlenecks. Especially after transactions or support interactions, as feedback at these stages might help reduce the highest-cost bottlenecks.

Some good examples of when to collect feedback:

• After a customer has upgraded to a paid plan
• After a customer has canceled their subscriptions
• Survey on your integrations page asking what integrations you’re missing

But you should also always have an open feedback channel. This can be a feedback button, portal, or widget so users can submit requests at any time.

2. Triaging

Triaging is the middle step between the user's request and adding it to your repository. 

It makes sure the feedback is in the proper format, gets assigned to the right team, and helps you identify what needs urgent action. This way, important stuff gets handled right away.

Featurebase helps by automatically sorting feedback and eliminating duplicate requests with AI.

You can also manually merge any related or duplicate ideas.

3. Analysing customer feedback

Having collected all of the feedback in one place, the next step is to analyze and organize it effectively.

The goal of customer feedback analysis is to make sense of all of the ideas and turn them into actionable steps.

This involves categorizing feedback by its urgency, importance, and type. You want to be able to identify trends and more critical issues quickly.

In addition, you can use different prioritization frameworks, like RICE or Value/Effort, to rank feature ideas by assigning them scores.

This allows you to conveniently visualize them on a simple matrix, which can be especially helpful during team brainstorming sessions.

With a well-organized feedback system, planning your next steps becomes data-driven. And more importantly - it becomes aligned with your customer's genuine needs.

P.S. Keep in mind that not all feedback is equal, and not all customer requests should be implemented. It's super important to consider your wider product vision and say "no" if needed.

4. Taking action & closing the loop

Now that you know the most urgent features, it's time to implement them.

With a proper customer feedback tool, you can integrate your issue management tool (Jira, Linear, Clickup, etc.) to convert feature requests into actionable issues there. 

This ensures that when your engineering team starts working on the request or a bug, the upvoted users are automatically notified via email.

However, it's still best to make an official update for the larger changes. This way, all customers can stay informed about the releases.

Public changelogs are excellent for this. They help you maintain a chronological order of all your updates. Changelogs also show you're constantly improving for future customers visiting your website.

Now, rinse and repeat this process.

Customer feedback management channels

You can collect feedback through many channels: public feedback portals, surveys, social media, email, live chat, third-party reviews, etc.

But some channels are better than others. And all channels should be pointed to a single place where all of your feedback can be managed.

Let's cover the most popular channels and how to operate them:

1. Public feedback portals

Public feedback portals are one of the best feedback channels. They are like product forums, where users can submit their feedback, view your roadmap, receive product updates, and more.

They allow users to vote on each others' ideas, helping Product Managers and Owners prioritize which features are in most demand based on the number of votes.

Public portals are a great way to create a community around your product and showcase transparency, as users can see what others are suggesting.

Your feedback portal is a great place to direct all of your other channels, whether through integrations or manually.

2. Feedback widgets

The advantage of in-app feedback widgets is that they provide a frictionless experience for your users when submitting feedback.

They don't have to visit yet another website and can do it all directly from your product or website. It also provides a unique opportunity to capture bug reports right where they happen. 

The best part is that it's not yet 'another feedback channel' since all of that feedback ends up conveniently in your feedback portal.

3. Public roadmaps

Sharing your public product roadmap is not only a good keeping users up to date about what's coming, but also a powerful way to collect and manage feature requests.

The roadmap's format shows your customers that you're already working on other's feature requests, encouraging them to submit their own as well.

And, of course, it helps your team keep track of the status, ETA, and order of different features.

Check out more awesome examples of public roadmaps →

4. Customer support chat

Customer support chat gives instant feedback during or after service chats. They can quickly highlight urgent bugs. Analyze these chats for trends and common issues.

The best part is that you can use integrations to channel feedback from these chats to your feedback portal, so you still have all ideas in one place for a better overview.

Learn to track feature requests with the Intercom integration →

5. Email

Customer feedback emails are a personal way to collect feedback after transactions or service interactions. This enables you to get feedback at key moments in the customer journey, such as after a purchase or service experience.

Email surveys can be embedded directly into messages, increasing the likelihood of customer engagement and response.

However, emails can't be easily integrated with feedback boards. This also means you get many duplicate requests because users won't see what others have already suggested.

So, while emails have their place, it's best to rely on feedback tools. Let's take a look at some of the best ones! 👇

Best 7 customer feedback management tools

While there are actually over 20 feedback management tools on the market, we handpicked the best ones. We analyzed their features, drawbacks, and pricing to help you pick out the perfect solution. Let's get into it!

1. Featurebase

Featurebase is one of the best customer feedback management tools. It has a neat interface and many features, including roadmaps, prioritization frameworks, and feedback widgets.

It comes with affordable pricing and a Free plan allowing for unlimited feedback. You can set it up in minutes and always get quick help through live chat. ⚡️

Featurebase's key features:

• Feedback boards, changelog, and a roadmap
• In-app widgets (see live demo)
• Surveys
• Sort feedback by monetary value 
• Prioritization frameworks
• Automated notification emails
• Custom domain
• User segmentation
• Single Sign-On
• API
• Over 6 + languages, including Spanish, German, French, etc.

Advantages of Featurebase:

• Intuitive interface - a neat and easy-to-use design for you and your users with gamified features like leaderboards to incentivize feedback
• AI duplicate post-detection - users & admins will see relevant similar posts before posting to reduce duplicates
• AI-powered search - always find that idea that you were looking for, even if you don't remember the exact wording
• Lots of customizations - have your boards look exactly the way you want by changing the colors, theme, text, and much more
• Replies and @ mentioning - intuitive comment section for lengthy discussions

Drawbacks of Featurebase:

• No HubSpot & Salesforce integrations (see existing integrations)

How much does Featurebase cost?

• Free Plan - unlimited posts, all basic features like a feedback board, roadmap, and changelog to take your product to the next level
• Growth Plan ($40/month) - 4 managers, all integrations and widgets, custom domain, and seamless user login
• Premium Plan ($124/month) - 8 managers, API, SSO, and user segmentation

All plans let you collect unlimited feedback, and you can try the paid ones with a 10-day free trial. See pricing here →

Featurebase reviews:

• Product Hunt - 4.9/5

Conclusion

Featurebase is one of the best and most affordable feedback management tools on the market. It lets you prioritize feedback by customer revenue, create roadmaps, use prioritization matrices, and much more.

Featurebase offers an intuitive interface with feedback boards, in-app widgets, a changelog, surveys, and much more.

The onboarding is amazingly quick and it comes with a Free plan, so there's no downside to trying it.

Learn more here →

2. Productboard

Productboard is an enterprise-focused roadmap tool. It mainly focuses on task management but can also validate feature ideas with your users. They have different feature prioritization frameworks and roadmap types.

Productboard's key features:

• Different task management views and features
• Prioritization frameworks
• Many translations

Advantages of Productboard:

• Lots of integrations to consolidate feedback
• Roadmaps are very customizable
• Meets ISO 27001:2013 and SOC2 standards for security

Drawbacks of Productboard:

• No changelog
• It doesn't let users see, upvote, or comment on their peers' ideas - only shows what admins have posted
• Complex user interface with a steep learning curve
• No commenting for engaging with users
• No embeddable widgets

How much does Productboard cost?

Productboard offers four plans to choose from:

• Starter - free
• Essentials - $20 per maker/month
• Pro - $80 per maker/month
• Enterprise - comes with a custom quote

Note: The total price of Productboard depends on the number of 'Makers' on your team. For example, five makers on their Pro plan will set you back a whopping $400 a month.

Productboard reviews:

• G2 - 4.3/5 (see complaints)
• Capterra - 4.6/5
• GetApp - 4.7/5

Conclusion

Productboard is an enterprise customer feedback suite focusing on issue tracking and roadmaps. You can do a lot, but figuring out how to use it is a project on its own.‌

It allows users to only see and upvote admins' posts, making it unideal for feedback collection.

If you're a smaller startup, we recommend checking out these affordable Productboard alternatives →

3. ProductPlan

ProductPlan is an enterprise roadmapping and issue-management tool. It has lots of features and customizations around roadmaps but lacks on the feedback collection side.

The enterprise plan includes a basic feedback form, but it will cost you A LOT while not having feedback boards and upvoting functions.

ProductPlan's key features:

• Roadmaps
• Prioritization frameworks
• Feedback form (only on enterprise)
• Single Sign-On

Advantages of ProductPlan:

• Customizable roadmap views & filters
• Lots of enterprise-grade integrations

Drawbacks of ProductPlan:

• Very expensive
• No changelog
• No feedback boards, no upvoting
• Complex user interface with a steep learning curve
• No commenting for engaging with users
• No embeddable widgets

How much does ProductPlan cost?

ProductPlan offers three plans that each offer only yearly billing:

• Basic ($20/editor/month) - unlimited roadmaps, prioritization board, customizable views & filters, some limited 1-way integrations
• Professional ($79/editor/month) - portfolio views, SSO, API, more advanced 2-way integrations
• Enterprise (contact sales) - Idea collection & validation, security reports, dedicated success rep

Note: The 'editor/month' pricing makes it very expensive. For example, 5 editors on the Professional plan will set you back $395/month.

ProductPlan reviews:

• G2 - 4.4/5
• Capterra - 4.5/5
• GetApp - 4.4/5

Conclusion

ProductPlan is an enterprise feedback management tool for corporate product teams. It has advanced roadmaps and prioritization features, making it good for task management.

However, with no feedback boards and upvoting, it's not intutive for collecting new ideas. Plus, the interface is quite aged and confusing.

Their pricing is high and for smaller startups there are more affordable alternatives to ProductPlan →

4. Canny.io

Canny.io is a popular feedback tool that also targets larger companies. It offers roadmaps, feedback boards, and changelogs. However, their paid plans cost a lot, and the free plan has a strict limit on monthly posts.

Canny's key features:

• Feedback boards, roadmaps, changelog
• Prioritization frameworks
• Feedback widget
• Automated status update notifications
• Duplicate post-detection
• Custom domain

Advantages of Canny:

• SOC2 compliance for enterprises
• Modern & intuitive design

Drawbacks of Canny:

• Very expensive pricing 
• No changelog popups
• No changelog emails
• No bulk editing
• No prioritization matrices
• No follow-up questions like "How important is this for you?" for extra insights
• Customers complain about not being listened to
• Supports only English

How much does Canny cost?

• Free plan - limits active posts to only 100 a month. For very small companies only
• $99/month (Starter Plan) - custom domain, roadmap, 2 integrations. Very limited in features, equal to competitors' free plans
• $399/month (Growth) - for 5 admins, user segmentation, private boards, and more
• Business (talk to sales) - unlimited boards, pay by invoice, SOC2, etc.

Canny Pricing 2024: Is It Worth It →

Canny reviews:

• G2 - 4.5/5 (complaints)
• Capterra - 4.8/5
• GetApp - 4.7/5

Conclusion

Canny is a reasonable feedback management tool for larger companies. They are SOC2 certified, support paying by invoice & have advanced moderation features. 

They offer a free plan that limits you to 100 posts and the most useful features are on the $399/mo plan, so it can get even quite expensive.

Check out these affordable Canny alternatives →

5. Roadmunk

Roadmunk is another feature roadmapping tool for larger companies. It helps product managers prioritize feature ideas to make better product decisions.

It's an expensive but robust tool with many rich features and integrations. However, it has its downsides, mostly on the feedback collection side.

Roadmunk's key features:

• Roadmaps - display upcoming features, manage and prioritize ideas on a roadmap view
• Feedback boards - let users submit ideas and upvote others' posts
• Prioritization frameworks - prioritize ideas using frameworks like Value vs Effort or RICE
• Integrations - connect Roadmunk with popular issue-tracking tools like Jira, Trello, and Monday
• Single Sign-On - automatically sign in users with your existing data

Advantages of Roadmunk:

• Customizable design and filter options
• Controlled Access for each member of the team
• Swimlane and Timeline are great features for internal presentations

Drawbacks of Roadmunk:

• Selecting dates from the calendar takes a lot of time. Users want a quicker way, like typing the date directly or copying and pasting
• There are reports of occasional lagging or slow performance
• It's not easy to customize some of the features

How much does Roadmunk cost?

Here are the 4 tiers with the main differences:

• Starter ($19/mo) - 1 admin, unlimited roadmaps, feedback collection & prioritization, One-way Jira, Azure, Trello integrations, 3 reviewers
• Business ($49/editor/mo) - customizations, dependencies, API, 5 reviewers. (Optional: Two-way Jira + Azure DevOps for $9/editor/mo)
• Professional ($99/editor/mo) - Single Sign-On, Two-way Jira + Azure DevOps, 10 reviewers
• Enterprise (custom $$$) - advanced customization, private cloud, custom nr of reviewers

It doesn't seem too expensive at first. However, if you take into account the 'per editor' pricing and compare its functionality to alternatives, it's quite a lot.

You can pay the same price for much more complete tools offering more seats and even get many of these features for free.

Roadmunk reviews:

• G2 - 4.0/5
• Gartner - 4.6/5
• TrustRadius - 8.9/10

Conclusion

Roadmunk is a good choice if creating customizable roadmaps is important to you. This, along with their prioritization frameworks makes it a good choice for managing feedback internally.

Feedback collection with Roadmunk is very primitive and they lack a public feedback board. It's not possible for users to upvote, chat with each other or view changelogs.

Check out the best Roadmunk alternatives →

6. Ducalis

Ducalis is a product feedback management software for mid-sized businesses. It has many advanced prioritization frameworks and matrices that can sometimes get confusing for regular users. It lacks multiple important features from the feedback collection and feature release sides.

Ducalis' key features:

• Public roadmaps (with feature voting)
• Changelog
• In-app widget
• Many prioritization frameworks
• User segmentation
• Automated email notifications
• Duplicate post-detection

Advantages of Ducalis:

• Customizable domain & email address
• Mobile friendly
• Has many different translations

Drawbacks of Ducalis:

• Complex UI, too many knobs everywhere
• Unintuitive in-app widget - in side peek format, that's too tight for showing the roadmap
• No follow-up questions like "How important is this for you?" for extra insights

How much does Ducalis cost?

Ducalis offers 5 pricing plans to choose from. Here's a simple breakdown of them:

• Free plan - unlimited ideas & boards, prioritization, 1-way integration from task trackers
• Pro ($5/month/admin) - feedback collection, changelog, in-app widget, 2-way integrations, dependencies, brand customizations
• Team ($10/month/admin) - custom domain, user roles, voting on behalf, limit number of votes per idea
• Business ($16/month/admin) - private voting board, some more advanced prioritization frameworks
• Enterprise (contact sales) - white labeling, usage insights, dedicated training sessions

TL;DR - Team plan is the most viable in terms of features. Business doesn't offer anything relevant in addition & Pro lacks some important features like voting on behalf and custom domain.

Ducalis reviews:

• G2 - 4.8/5

Conclusion

Ducalis is definitelly a nice choice for specialized PMs that are looking for a robust product management software. However, it has a steep learning curve and can be difficult for your users.

They have a decent pricing, with most of the necessary features on the Team plan.

Check out these top Ducalis alternaitves →

7. featureOS

featureOS - once Hellonext - is a feedback platform that also has roadmaps and management functions. As the name suggests, it's packed with many useful features. If you want detailed control over every aspect of the feedback board, featureOS is a good choice.

featureOS key features:

• Feedback boards, changelogs, roadmaps
• Widget for feedback collecting
• Duplicate post-detection
• A knowledge base feature
• Replies and @ mentioning

Advantages of featureOS:

• Modern design
• Lots of customizations
• Feature-rich

Drawbacks of featureOS:

• No changelog popups
• Can't sort feedback by monetary value
• No user segmentation
• No built-in prioritization frameworks
• Supports only English

How much does featureOS cost?

FeatureOS offers three pricing tiers:

• Runway ($29/month) - 2 boards, 1 admin, 1 integration
• Take Flight ($79/month) - 10 boards, 3 admins, 3 integrations
• Fly High ($149/month) - unlimited boards, 10 admins, SSO, API

You can try each out with a 14-day trial.

Note: They have offered free plans many times in the past and overall change the pricing rather often. Last time, they closed the free plan overnight.

featureOS reviews:

• Product Hunt - 4.5/5

Conclusion

featureOS is a great feedback management software. It has many features, including a roadmaps, changelog, and a knowledge base.

However, it's missing some important ones, like sorting feedback by revenue and prioritization frameworks.

They offer a pretty great pricing comapred to some of the larger companies in this list, but they change it constantly, so there's always some uncertainty.

Check out the best alternatives to featureOS →

Conclusion

Customer feedback management is key to building a product your users love. By collecting, analyzing, and acting on feedback, you can prioritize your product roadmap, reduce churn, and strengthen customer relationships.

Tools like Featurebase make this process easy with public voting boards, roadmaps, prioritization features, surveys, and much more. It comes with a Free plan that allows for unlimited feedback, so there's no downside to trying it.

Adopting a solid feedback management system will not only meet but exceed customer expectations. By making feedback a core part of your strategy, you can turn your users into loyal advocates and drive business growth. 👇

Start collecting and managing feedback for free today →