Why Collecting In-App Feedback is Important for Mobile UX
Brought on by the steady rise in mobile users and usage worldwide, mobile user experience (or Mobile UX) has recently become a major focal point for many digital marketers. It essentially encompasses how customers experience a mobile app while they’re active in the app itself. With the goal of offering a smooth and user-friendly UX, mobile UX is something which must be continuously optimised – especially if businesses wish to maintain a loyal and satisfied customer base. This is where the collection of in-app feedback comes in handy.
The in-app feedback collection process is slightly different from that of websites. The difference lies mainly in the way that feedback forms are run. For example, a lot of the triggers such as exit intent and mouse movement are no longer detectable in mobile apps. This difference in feedback collection calls for a different approach, but we’ll get to that later…
So what is it exactly that in-app feedback can do for your mobile user experience? Let’s take a look.
Why collect in-app feedback?
There are three main reasons why it is strongly advised to collect in-app feedback:
1. Keeps you in touch with how your app is performing. One of the great things about collecting in-app feedback is that it can give you very specific feedback on, for example, a feature you’ve launched (or intend to launch) or an update you’ve recently come out with.
According to the Lean Start-Up methodology, applying short feedback cycles before building a product (also known as minimum viable product) is the key to creating a truly successful product. These cycles enable you to continually test out ideas in your app by collecting feedback from customers (or other parties, such as buyers and partners) and using that feedback to make further improvements and enhance the app.
2. It will help save money. Developing a mobile app can be an expensive undertaking. Adding new features and altering existing ones can be quite costly if these decisions are based on presumptions alone. By collecting feedback from customers who have experienced your app first-hand, you will be much better equipped to make meaningful changes to your app.
3. Familiarises you with your customers. In addition to providing you with insights into the customer journey and how your customers are experiencing the app, in-app feedback can also provide you with detailed information about these customers. You can collect data such as demographics, browser type, OS and more.
Having this information on hand enables you to form personas (or classifications of users). If you cross analyse personas with other feedback results across analyse personas with other feedback results (such as Net Promoter Score, Customer Effort Score or Customer Satisfaction) you’ll be able to create not only a more personalised experience for your customers but also develop an app you know they’ll like.
Different ways of collecting in-app feedback
Recognising that the collection of in-app feedback can be valuable to your company is one thing. Doing something about it is another. With native and hybrid apps (this does not include mobile-optimised websites), there are three ways in which feedback can be collected: Webviews, API posts and SDKs. Which method should you choose? This is entirely up to you and your business.
In my next article, I will weigh the pros and cons of each of these collection methods, which will hopefully make your decision-making process just a tad bit easier.