Closing the feedback loop: a 10-minute audit of what you shipped
The short answer
Closing the feedback loop means telling each person who asked that it shipped. To see how many you missed, list what you shipped in the last 30 days, who asked for each, and whether they were told. Then send a short note to each. Share Back in Annsa drafts that note; you send it.
A closing the feedback loop audit is a ten-minute look at the last 30 days: what you shipped, which of it a customer asked for, and whether you told them. Most small teams find a gap. The work is live; the person who asked has no idea. This page gives you the sheet, a note to send each person, and where Annsa fits.
TL;DR
- List what you shipped in the last 30 days. Mark each one a customer asked for. Write who asked. Mark whether they were told.
- Count the untold ones. That number is the cost you could not see before.
- Send each person a short note. Close the loop is the name for that last step.
How to use it: open a doc, paste the sheet below, and fill it from your tracker, your changelog and your inbox. Set a timer for ten minutes. Stop when it rings.
The audit sheet
One row per thing shipped. The columns after "Who asked" are the point.
Closing the feedback loop audit (last 30 days, one row per thing shipped)
What shipped (in the customer's words): [one sentence]
Date shipped: [day]
Asked by a customer? (yes / no): [if no, stop here]
Who asked, account, and where: [name, company, call / Slack / support chat]
Their words: [exact line, if you have it]
Told by me? (yes / no): [a changelog post counts as no]
Note to send: [ ] drafted [ ] sent Date: [day]
Totals at the bottom:
Shipped from a customer request: [N]
Of those, told: [N]
Not told: [N]
Result: "You shipped [N] things customers asked for this month,
and [N] of them were told."
What does each part ask?
- What shipped. Use the words a customer would use, not the ticket title. If you cannot say it to them in a sentence, that is a clue, too.
- Date. It sets how long the person has waited.
- Asked by a customer? Be honest. A fix you found yourself is not a request, and a note about it is optional.
- Who asked, and where. Name, account and the place you heard it: a call, Slack, a support chat. If you cannot find who asked, write "unknown". That is a finding, not a failure.
- Their words. The exact line, if you still have it. It makes the note personal.
- Told? Yes only if that person heard it from you. A changelog post or a line in a newsletter is "no". It reached them only if they happened to read it.
An example, filled in
All numbers here are made up, to show the shape.
| What shipped | Date | Asked by | Their words | Told? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Export invoices to CSV | 3 Oct | Maya, Northwind | "I need to get invoices into our books" | No |
| Dark mode on the dashboard | 8 Oct | Dev, Harbor Labs | "Too bright at night" | No |
| Fix for the failed upload | 12 Oct | Sam, Orchard | "It just spins" | Yes, replied in thread |
| Faster search | 18 Oct | Found it myself | n/a | n/a |
| Team invites by link | 20 Oct | Lena, Fieldwork | "Hard to add my whole team" | No |
Example result: you shipped 4 things customers asked for this month, and 1 of them was told. Three people are still using the old version of your product in their heads.
That sentence is the point of the page. The work was done. The credit, and the next piece of feedback, went nowhere.
A short note to send each person
Keep it to a few lines. Their words first, then what changed, then where to find it, then one question.
Subject: You can now [what they asked for, in their words]
Hi [First name],
A while back you told me:
"[Their words, one or two sentences]"
That's now built. [One sentence on what changed, in their terms.]
You'll find it at [screen name or link].
Did it solve it for you? Reply either way. A "not quite" is as
useful as a yes.
[Your name]
Three rules: send it as you, to one person, by name. Quote them. Do not bundle two features into one note. For more templates, including one for when it shipped differently from what they asked, see feature shipped email templates.
What if the answer is "they were never told"?
Send the note now. A late note beats none. Add one line: "Sorry this took a while to reach you." People rarely mind. They mind being ignored.
Then set a habit so the gap does not come back. One easy version: when you mark something shipped, you open the requester's name and write the note before you close the tab. For why this matters and the ways teams try to do it, see close the loop on customer feedback.
Where does Annsa fit?
You can run this audit by hand with a doc. It gets hard when the asks come from Slack, Intercom, calls and surveys, because the "who asked" has to be found each time.
Annsa keeps the customer behind each request, their exact words, the account and its revenue on each request. When a job ships, Share Back drafts a note to each person who asked. You read it, change it and send it. Annsa does not send for you. See Share Back.
What should you do now?
- Run the audit. Ten minutes.
- Send the notes. One per person.
- Pick a day each week to repeat the audit for seven days of work, not thirty. It takes two minutes.