We were 99% sure everyone would love REX and find no fault with the tool, but to err on the side of caution we thought we had best get some people to confirm what we already knew – that he was perfect (strangely this isn’t what happened).

It turns out you can’t just yell into the abyss for feedback and expect bullet-pointed helpful criticisms, divided into helpful sub-sections - who knew eh?

Luckily we were rescued by our feedback groups, who, persuaded by a sack of orange REX hats and 1000 stickers, gave us structured feedback in sessions as test users – our heroes in orange hats.

Our feedback sessions not only helped us gain an insight into the work we had already done, but informed decisions on new feature ideas and importantly payment plans – it was always a goal to make REX accessible and affordable, but the resulting payment structure was almost entirely as a result of our tango-topped testers (not my best work there, sorry).

So if you too have found yourself yelling into the night sky “TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT” with limited success, here are some tips for getting feedback:

• You can’t just release a product, offer people free use of it, and expect everyone will return actionable feedback. Some do, most don’t. But there’s a good reason why…
• Feedback has value for a company, so don’t expect it to be free. In our naivety we assumed people would love to spend time analysing our product and giving opinions, but it takes time and energy for your testers so plan for this accordingly.
• If you’re clueless (like us) then enlist the help of someone who is is well connected and knows what they’re doing to organise feedback sessions and/or testers for you, and be ready to pay them properly to do it. It’s worth it we promise.
• Get feedback from an eclectic group, both because it's more useful to have a broad range of voices but also because that's what your audience will look like. If you're struggling to find that mix, get some help like we did from someone like Inclusively Tech.
• Not all the people giving feedback will agree, so multiple sessions are helpful to get themes and assign priority to changes/features.
• Don't go into feedback sessions or testing with an ego, be ready for them to tell you your baby looks like a goblin, and tell them that positive feedback doesn’t improve the product. It is nice to hear though.
• Try to get feedback not just from potential end users, but also the budget holders, as they’ll be signing off the purchase. If they don’t understand the product and how it benefits their company, they won't sign it off.
• People like orange hats.