In today's world, it is more important than ever to be able to innovate and come up with new ideas. That's where the use case of idea management software comes into play.
FeedBear allows businesses to collect and organize their ideas in one place, making it easy for them to come up with new solutions to old problems. In this blog post, we will discuss the benefits of using such tool, and will provide a few examples of how it can be used in the real world.
As your company scales, managing ideas becomes more complex. Potentially valuable ideas are never shared - or lost across chat messages, email chains, and excel sheets. This is where FeedBear can help.
What Is Idea Management?
Idea management is the process of collecting, sorting, and evaluating ideas. It helps businesses focus on the most promising ideas and to track the progress of those ideas from conception to implementation.
The Benefits of Idea Management Software
Perhaps the most important benefit is that it allows businesses to collect and organize their ideas in one place. This makes it easy for them to come up with new solutions to old problems.
Additionally, idea management software can help businesses track the progress of their ideas from conception to implementation. This is valuable because you can see which ideas are working and which ones are not. Additionally, idea management tools can help businesses evaluate the feasibility of their ideas before any time and resources are invested into them.
Key Features of Idea Management Software
Idea board
This is a central place where ideas can be posted and sorted. This is a hub for innovation and a dashboard where the progress of each idea can be tracked. In FeedBear, you can manage your ideas with our feedback board, where you can add new ideas and have customers and team members upvote them and leave comments.
Upvoting
As ideas are posted, they can be voted on by the community. The most popular ideas will rise to the top, while the less popular ideas will sink to the bottom. Also, users can leave comments on ideas to provide feedback. This flows pretty smoothly in FeedBear and you can quickly spot the ideas that are worth pursuing.
Single Sign-On
With Single Sign-On, users can log in with their existing credentials (such as Google or Facebook). This makes it easy to get started without having to remember yet another username and password. In FeedBear, customers can vote anonymously too.
Discussions
To make it easy for team members to provide feedback on ideas, there is a discussion board where users can start new threads or reply to existing ones. As mentioned, this works really well in FeedBear and in case of a public board, a sign-up might not even be required. You can quickly tell apart your customers and your team members based on the profiles in the discussion.
Status updates
Keep everyone in the loop by posting updates on the progress of each idea. This way, everyone knows what is being worked on and what still needs to be done.
The great news is - you don’t have to worry about that in FeedBear. Once someone leaves a comment or upvotes something, they get automatic email updates on that item from that point on. This makes closing the feedback loop pretty effortless.
Roadmap view
Previewing the idea roadmap gives everyone a quick overview of what is being worked on and what is coming up next. This is especially useful for software products where features are produced in small batches. In FeedBear, you can create private and public roadmaps in a matter of clicks. All you have to do is connect your FeedBear feedback board and you're good to go.
Privacy
Whether you want to keep your ideas private or make them public, idea management software gives you the ability to do both. You can also choose to share your ideas with specific team members or with everyone in your organization.
In FeedBear, customers can create a profile to add ideas and upvote them or they can choose to remain anonymous.
Key features to look for in an idea management software
Now that you know the benefits of using use case idea management software, you may be wondering what to look for in such a tool. Here are a few key features to look for:
Ease of use: The best idea management software is easy to use and doesn’t require a lot of training.
Flexibility: The software should be flexible enough to accommodate your specific needs.
Integrations: Idea management software should integrate seamlessly with the other tools you use, such as project management software.
Collaboration: An idea management software should make it easy for team members to collaborate on ideas.
Tracking: The software should also provide a way to track the progress of ideas from inception to implementation.
When evaluating different idea management software options, keep these features in mind to ensure you choose something that your entire team can benefit from in the long run.
6 Characteristics that You Should Consider when Selecting an Idea Management Software
- User-Friendly: easy to use and understand, as your own team will simply not bother with it otherwise. Not only does this make the learning curve smoother and the tool more approachable, but it increases overall retention with your customers as well as your internal team.
- Engaging: Feedbear allows your customers to easily engage with each other and your team by interacting through threads and items on your feedback board.
- Transparent: The more users can see ideas and comments, regardless of immediate personal relevance or expertise, the more anyone with an opinion can speak their mind. FeedBear does this by having team members participate on your public board allowing you tocreate an even better, more transparent discussion platform. You can also use FeedBear as a private internal board too!
- Approachable: if you can create a post on Facebook, you have all the skills and knowledge you need to create a feedback ticket on FeedBear too.
On your own roadmap, you can share what you’re working on with your users, stakeholders, and yes, even competitors!
- Versatile: You can use FeedBear for anything from gathering feedback about the latest feature you launched to creating a full-blown product roadmap and changelog.
- Process-driven: managing ideas via a dedicated tool is only as effective as the underlying idea management process behind it. Feedbear is a platform for gathering ideas. However, you can create a full-blown process for putting those ideas into action with a roadmap and update your customers when your ideas are done using a changelog.
Get your own idea management software today
If you’re looking for a great way to collect, organize and act on ideas, try FeedBear today! No matter what you’re working on, FeedBear is an excellent way to turn customers’ ideas into a product roadmap that delivers results and makes your team and your customers happy. Sign up today to get started!