Designing a focused feedback board for SaaS teams — from competitive research and user personas through to a complete high-fidelity UI system, grounded in real PM workflows.
Product managers and founders at early-stage SaaS companies (5–30 people) track customer feedback across Slack threads, spreadsheets, emails, and sticky notes. Feature requests get lost, duplicates pile up, and there's no way to see which requests have the most demand. By the time they build something, they've often built the wrong thing.
Enterprise tools like Canny ($399/mo for useful features) and UserVoice ($1,333/mo) are overkill and overpriced. Simple tools like Nolt and Fider have outdated UIs, no analytics dashboard, and no way to close the feedback loop. There's a clear gap in the $15–50/mo range for a modern, focused tool that's powerful enough to prioritise but simple enough to set up in 5 minutes.
Before opening Figma I audited four direct and indirect competitors to find specific UX failures and pricing gaps the product could exploit.
FeedbackDrop serves two completely different people simultaneously — the admin managing the product, and the end user submitting ideas. I created a primary and secondary persona to keep both in view throughout every design decision.
“I have feedback scattered across 4 tools and my own memory. Every quarter I spend a full week just trying to figure out what to build next — and I'm still not confident I picked right.”
— Lisa, user persona
“My users DM me on Twitter with feature requests. I 'heart' them and then forget. I need something so simple that I'll actually use it — not another tool I sign up for and abandon.”
— Jake, user personaI mapped Lisa's end-to-end feedback workflow to find where the pain is worst — then reframed each pain point as a design opportunity.
| Stage | 1. Receive feedback | 2. Log & organise | 3. Prioritise | 4. Decide & plan | 5. Close the loop |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tasks | Check Intercom, Slack, email, sales notes | Copy into spreadsheet, tag, check duplicates | Count votes, weigh business goals, compare effort | Pick features for sprint, justify to stakeholders | Email users, update changelog |
| Emotion | 😫 Overwhelmed Feedback everywhere | 😤 Tedious Manual copy-paste | 😟 Uncertain No confidence in data | 😰 Anxious Gut feel, not data | 😔 Guilty Forgets to follow up |
| Pain point | 5+ channels to check daily | Duplicates pile up unseen | Votes ≠ business value | No data to show leadership | Users feel ignored |
| Opportunity | Widget + integrations | Auto-dedup + tagging | Impact scoring | Visual priority dashboard | Auto-notify on status change |
These pain points became four design challenges that shaped every screen:
HMW help PMs see which feedback actually matters — not just which has the most votes?
HMW make the feedback board feel like part of the customer's own product?
HMW close the loop — so users who gave feedback know their voice was heard?
HMW get a new user from signup to first feedback in under 5 minutes?
Not every feature belongs in v1. I used MoSCoW prioritisation to scope FeedbackDrop to four core features — each one mapped to a specific pain point from the user journey.
Public board where users submit and upvote ideas.
Trends, top requests, volume at a glance.
Under review → Planned → In progress → Shipped → Closed.
Tag by type, filter, sort, search.
Deferred to v2: email notifications, embeddable widget, board customisation, Slack integration, impact scoring, and public roadmap — each validated by research but not essential for the core feedback loop.
FeedbackDrop has two entry points — the authenticated admin panel (4 screens) and the public board (1 screen). I mapped the full IA before wireframing to make sure no screen was designed in isolation.
The admin panel flows left-to-right: Dashboard (overview) → Feedback (all items) → Detail (single item) → Settings (configuration). The public board is a standalone branded page accessible without login.
I mapped three core flows to validate the IA and spot friction before building any UI.
I built the design system before touching any screens so components could be created once and reused everywhere — ensuring visual consistency across all 5 views.
All 5 screens built at 1440×900px. Each one maps directly to a section of the IA and solves a specific job from the user journey.
Lisa's home base. Four KPI metrics (total feedback, new this month, shipped, avg votes), top requests by votes with status pills, status breakdown bar chart, 12-month feedback trend, and a live activity feed — all on a single screen.
Full list of all feedback. Status filter pills at top (Under review · 64, Planned · 36, In progress · 18, Shipped · 12), search bar, sort control. Vote-first layout — every item leads with the upvote count on the left.
Deep dive into a single request. Full description, 42 voter avatars, comment thread with admin badges. Right sidebar: status dropdown (with notification count "42 voters will be notified"), category, and metadata card.
The customer-facing page. White-labelled with Acme App's brand identity — logo, name, custom subdomain feedback.acme.com. Purple hero header, search + sort tabs, 'New Idea' CTA, ranked feedback list. 'Powered by FeedbackDrop' footer is the only FD brand mark.
Admin configuration in a tabbed layout: Branding (name, description, brand color #6D28D9, custom domain with CNAME helper), Categories (chip management with + Add), Widget (embed <script> with copy button, toggle controls), Integrations (Slack connected, Linear + Intercom with Connect buttons).
Every choice traces back to a research finding or a competitive gap.
“In B2B design, the best UX is often invisible density— surfacing exactly the right information at the right moment, without the user feeling overwhelmed. The hardest part isn't adding features. It's deciding which 5 screens to build and which 15 to leave for v2.”