Feature voting is a feedback management approach where users can vote on or upvote feature requests submitted by other users. The features with the most votes theoretically indicate what users want most.

How It Works

Users submit feature requests to a public board. Other users can browse and vote on requests they also want. Product teams use vote counts to help prioritize their roadmap.

Pros and Cons

Benefits:

• Democratic and transparent
• Easy for users to participate
• Shows what's popular
• Creates community engagement
• Reduces duplicate requests

Drawbacks:

• Loud minorities can dominate
• Enterprise customers often don't want their requests public
• Doesn't account for business impact (100 votes from free users vs 1 request from enterprise customer)
• Can bias teams toward incremental improvements
• Creates expectation that popular = will be built

When to Use Feature Voting

Feature voting works best for:

• Consumer products with large user bases
• Community-driven products
• Open-source projects
• Products with transparent development
• Brands building in public

It's less suitable for:

• B2B enterprise software
• Products with complex buyer personas
• When customer requests contain sensitive competitive information
• Startups still finding product-market fit

Alternatives to Feature Voting

Instead of public voting, some teams use:

• In-app feedback with AI prioritization
• Private feature requests weighted by customer value
• Customer advisory boards
• Usage analytics combined with selective feedback
• Impact scoring based on business metrics