Kudos to Yahoo! for launching the Digg style Yahoo! Suggestion Board. I think it is a terrific tool for collecting user experience issues directly from the customers. Users can add a suggestion for any Yahoo! property to the board and fellow users can vote for the suggestion if they agree with it. Suggestions with the most votes are listed at the top.I think this is an excellent and innovative way to find out where customers are having problems and the types of solutions they would like to see implemented. What better way to flush out bugs and new features than to have the customer let you know what they want changed.
This is a type of interaction with the customer that I have discussed with many companies. The benefits of this type of feedback are obvious, but the risks are quite substantial. For instance, now that Yahoo! has built this tool and it is being populated by their loyal customers, the customers have a right to expect that Yahoo! will act on the highest rated requests. However, the customers' primary goal is usefulness where the product managers' goals are often revenue. At many high tech companies, these goals, and subsequent feature requests, sadly are not in alignment.
Next, this type of service requires moderation. Disgruntled customers who have no customer service outlet (especially for the free services Yahoo! provides) can poison a public feedback forum with their anger. I see in the Help section that Yahoo! reserves the right to remove posts if they are not "respectful." Moderating this type of service requires substantial customer service resources which most companies are not willing to spend. Dell comes to mind as an amazing exception with their Dell Community forums where customers answer each others' support questions.
Lastly, from a strategic standpoint, a service like Yahoo! Suggestion Board exposes user experience issues and feature requests to the internal development team and also to any competitors. For large companies like Yahoo! this may not be a concern. For smaller and medium sized companies struggling for market share, allowing the world to see your dirty laundry is a scary proposition.
Because of the concerns listed above, I have not worked with a company who was willing to try a suggestion board. I give a lot of credit to Yahoo! for taking this approach. Now the rest of us will sit back and see if there are any results.
Labels: customer feedback, ue research
posted by Shawn Elson on Thursday, February 15, 2007
Comments:
While I respect your opinion I think you miss the point.
It's about the user, not the company or corporation.
People are passionate about the products/services/businesses they use in their lives everyday and a well moderated place with a voting system is a good model.
People want recognition, that's the power of the web, youtube, myspace, any place where people can add their 10 cents is an opportunity.
Companies want to know what their customers think, but they don't want to organise or manage the interface or infrastructure for that.
Just my 10 cents
Jeff
Good point Jeff. I think this sort of service is about the user and their opinions. However, if Yahoo! customers take the time to write up suggestions which are just going to be ignored, I believe Yahoo! will deserve a lot of backlash.
The point of the service is for Yahoo! to invite suggestions that will improve the site, not for Yahoo! to provide a place where customers can vent without seeing results.
Shawn,
Users want recognition, most users are honest and want to help see something they use made better.
I hardly think users will get that upset if their voted suggestions don't get taken on board.
Users are all about self first and effects second
Suggestion boards would always attract a mix of great idea and vented frustration.
There's actually a great idea in the news of what Yahoo and Dell are doing to work with customers.
Companies want to hear from customers and maybe even employees, but they don't want to roll out and maintain the programs to facilitate that.
There's opportunity.
Jeff
David Dalka reports that Yahoo! is deleting posts from their suggestion board. Hopefully this is just an early bug in the system and not Yahoo! showing bad form.
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