Improve Ideas Forum!! Merge similar ideas
Answered
I would like to see an improvement in the ideas forum.
We are often directed via support tickets to add suggestions to the ideas forum.
aXcelerate support staff work hard to respond but a couple of improvements could potentially make it easier for all.
The search function doesn't seem to have a clear logic, I will try to search for other ideas first to see if something similar has been suggested but ideas seem to be displayed in an odd order, not sure if it is the date, comments, votes or random. (picture at bottom of this idea)
Also, it appears you can't search properly on mobile.
When an email comes in about an idea you are following, when you click the link it requires you to sign in, even if you are already signed into aXcelerate on your browser.
So you need to go to the ideas forum from aXcelerate to comment on the idea which you receive the email link about.
It could be useful for aXcelerate to merge ideas that are similar to get a better picture of overall responses and also it would make it easier on our end to track the ideas progress.
Sometimes an idea is linked to another but it is not clear which idea to follow, I am finding this issue with the recent QR codes on Certs, the cert verification API issues and the multiple ideas in the system about this.
https://axcelerate.zendesk.com/hc/en-gb/community/posts/202798484-Online-Certificate-Verification
It could also be useful if we understood how many votes are required for an idea to be considered, as a recent idea has a lot of upvotes but there doesn't seem to have been a response on it yet.
Some ideas seem to take a little while to build up traction but this one is fairly recent.
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Official comment
Hi Pip
Thank you for all your feedback. Emails / Suggestions like this example are what aid us in continually improving our product and service offering!
Before responding, I need to highlight that we utilise Zendesk, a third-party program, for our Help Centre and Ideas Forum, meaning we have little control over the functionality available. With this in mind, I will address your feedback below:
Search functionality/behaviour - I've reviewed the settings in place for our instance of Zendesk, and this is not something we are able to control.
When an email comes in about an idea you are following, when you click the link it requires you to sign in, even if you are already signed into aXcelerate on your browser.
We have setup SSO so that you do not need to sign-up for a Help Centre account; Instead, we use your aXcelerate credentials to login to the help centre. There's no perfect solution to this, however if you go to the Help & Support Centre from aXcelerate first, and then click the link from your inbox, it should correctly direct you to the correct thread.
It could be useful for aXcelerate to merge ideas that are similar to get a better picture of overall responses and also it would make it easier on our end to track the ideas progress.
Sometimes an idea is linked to another but it is not clear which idea to follow, I am finding this issue with the recent QR codes on Certs, the cert verification API issues and the multiple ideas in the system about this.
Again, this is largely outside of our control - Zendesk does not have a merge feature for community posts. Ironically, you can see this is suggested here, in Zendesk's ideas forum, and the representative is unable to merge the thread into an existing one.
I will say, we (aXcelerate) could be a lot better at locking duplicate posts, and referring users to the original thread. I will add this to our radar and begin actioning this in a similar way to the Zendesk thread I linked above.
It could also be useful if we understood how many votes are required for an idea to be considered, as a recent idea has a lot of upvotes but there doesn't seem to have been a response on it yet.
There is no 'rule' for which features get implemented based on the number of votes. We use the votes as an indication for how much interest there is in a particular suggestion. However, there are other things we take into consideration when reviewing suggestions, such as product vision, how many users would benefit from a change, how often users would benefit from this change (e.g., day-to-day, vs only in initial account setup), and the amount of development work required.
For example, if a suggestion makes sense from a usability perspective, aligns with our vision for aXcelerate, and takes 5 minutes to implement, even with only 1 vote, it is likely that change would be implemented.
In contrast, if a suggestion makes sense from a usability perspective, aligns with our vision for aXcelerate, has 100 votes yet would take 2+ years to implement, we would need to consider whether the impact of the change (in this case, very large) would outweigh the impact we could have by making 2 years worth of small impact changes.
So to summarise, we evaluate each suggestion on an individual basis, and there is really no rule for what, or when, a suggestion will get implemented.
Talking specifically to the example you've included in your screenshot above regarding the calendar integrations submitted by Kate Penney, we are currently in the process of building a Google Calendar integration. This is being done in a developer's own time as an Overtime project, so there is no hard timeline on that. However, we're aware this would be a popular feature, so we're definitely giving it enough attention to avoid losing momentum.
We've also built the foundation for the integration in a way that will allow other calendar integrations (e.g., Outlook) to be more easily implemented in the future.
I will respond to that specific Ideas Forum post with the information I've included here regarding that specific request, for improved visibility.
Hopefully my response has provided some clarity for you. Your feedback has definitely been great for the team and I!
Comment actions -
Hi Pip,
Thank you for your recent comments and submissions to the Ideas Forum. Yes, unfortunately, there are multiple submissions for the same idea, however, Zendesk does not allow us to merge submissions. The best we can do is close posts for comments.
Personally, if we build a feature, I will comment on all of the duplicate posts as Zendesk will send a notification to those users who have commented and are following the post. If I were to only comment on the latest (or highest voted), some users may not realise their followed suggestion has been delivered. I will also close comments if I notice a duplicate.
Any post or comment into the Ideas Forum does help us understand what our users are requesting and will shape what we work on in the future. We assess feature requests based on several factors, such as the number of client votes, the relevance of the suggested feature to the broader client base, and the scope of work required to implement the feature. For example, a simple feature that will benefit a large percentage of clients is likely to be implemented before a complex feature with a similar number of votes, that will only benefit a smaller percentage of clients.
I hope this helps, and thanks again for your commitment to our product.
Cheers,
Rod. -
Hi Mark and Rod,
Greatly appreciate both your feedback and the insights into the ideas forum, I definitely have a better understanding of it now which I think will help me use it more productively.
The search results seem organised than random, so 3 will be in order by date, then some will be in order by replies, so maybe it has a few layers to the display or it could just be completely random, but I understand that is a Zendesk thing now.
I'll try to remember to sign in to the Help and Support centre before clicking the link, thank you.
Oh gosh, that is interesting that Zendesk has a thread about merging their own threads. Hopefully, it might be something they explore in the future as it could be something that makes it a little easier for users like yourselves.
Linking threads together in the comments would be really helpful, I have noticed Rod does that, which is excellent. Perhaps if a support ticket is lodged, and the rep thinks we should add to the ideas forum they could direct us to an existing post if they believe it is aligned, although I realise there are heaps, but if they are aware of one already. I have had a rep do that before and it was helpful.
That is really cool that you are looking at the calendar idea, hopefully, it will work out and that would be great for scheduling and notifying students and trainers of upcoming events. Thank you for updating that thread, I'll keep an eye out for updates.
It is really good to understand the factors that influence the decision to adopt an idea, sometimes an issue we identify, like the current one with displaying totals for grouped workshops seems so logical but another RTO may run courses differently and just showing the max for 1 workshop in the group suits them, it would be cool to have options to suit both in these situations but I guess you can't implement every little idea and there are a lot of settings which helps with flexibility, which is great.
I will continue to check the ideas forum and provide (hopefully helpful) feedback on ideas that could also benefit our RTO. We are looking forward to the learning plan release this week to see how will work for us. :)
Thanks again, we appreciate the work you all put in.
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