Next-Level Product Discovery: 10 Tools Every Team Needs

What Is a Product Discovery Software?

Product discovery software is a versatile and indispensable toolkit for product managers and development teams designed to empower them in various stages of the product development lifecycle, from conception to evolution. These tools serve as the bedrock upon which innovative and user-centric products are built.

Let's break down the key facets of product discovery software:

1. Idea Incubation and Validation

The journey of creating a remarkable product often begins with a spark—an idea. Product discovery software provides a fertile ground for these ideas to incubate and take shape. 

It allows teams to collect, document, and evaluate potential product concepts. 

Through user surveys, feedback mechanisms, and ideation boards, product discovery tools facilitate idea validation by gauging user interest and market viability.

2. User-Centric Insights

User behavior lies at the heart of product development. Understanding how users interact with your product is crucial. Product discovery software gives you the ability to observe and analyze user behavior comprehensively. 

This includes tracking user journeys, monitoring feature usage, and identifying pain points in the user experience. 

Armed with these insights, product teams can make informed decisions that align with user needs and expectations.

3. Feedback and Iteration

User feedback is the lifeblood of iterative product development. These tools enable teams to capture user feedback systematically through surveys, feedback forms, and in-app communication. 

Additionally, they provide mechanisms for categorizing and prioritizing feedback, ensuring that the most critical issues are addressed promptly. 

This feedback loop fosters continuous improvement, allowing products to evolve in sync with user demands.

4. Audience Segmentation

Not all users are the same. Product discovery software offers segmentation capabilities that allow teams to categorize users based on various criteria, such as demographics, behavior, or preferences. 

This segmentation is invaluable for tailoring product features, messaging, and marketing efforts to specific audience segments. 

By delivering personalized experiences, teams can boost user engagement and satisfaction.

5. Efficient Onboarding

Introducing users to a new product or guiding them through updates and features can be challenging. Product discovery software streamlines this process with user onboarding features. 

These tools offer interactive guides, tutorials, and in-app messaging to help users navigate and adopt new features seamlessly. 

Effective onboarding not only reduces churn but also enhances the overall user experience.

What Are Different Types of Tools Used for Product Discovery?

To streamline our discussion, let's break down the various types of tools commonly used in the product discovery process. We'll explore five crucial categories:

1. User Session Recording Tools

User session recording tools are invaluable for gaining insight into how users interact with your product. 

They allow you to record and replay user sessions, helping you identify pain points, areas of improvement, and user behavior patterns.

2. Product Analytics Tools

Product analytics tools provide in-depth data and metrics on how users engage with your product. 

They enable you to track user journeys, monitor feature usage, and measure the impact of product changes.

3. Surveying Tools

Surveying tools help you gather direct feedback from users, enabling you to understand their needs, preferences, and pain points. 

Surveys are essential for validating assumptions and making data-driven decisions.

4. Segmentation Tools

Segmentation tools allow you to divide your user base into distinct groups based on various criteria, such as demographics, behavior, or preferences. 

Segmentation helps you tailor your product and messaging to specific audience segments.

5. Onboarding Platforms

Onboarding platforms facilitate the process of introducing new users to your product or guiding existing users through updates and new features. 

Effective onboarding boosts user engagement and reduces churn.

Now, let's dive into the specific product discovery tools that can supercharge your product development efforts.

Product Discovery Software You Need to Use

1. UserGuiding - Survey, Segment, Onboard, and Engage Users

UserGuiding is a versatile product discovery tool that covers multiple aspects of the discovery process. It excels in surveying customers, segmenting them based on their responses, and sending personalized content to enhance user engagement. 

UserGuiding also streamlines user onboarding, ensuring a seamless introduction to new products and features.

UserGuiding offers a wide range of features, including:

1. Interactive Product Tours,
2. Tooltips and Hotspots,
3. User Onboarding Checklists,
4. Resource Centers,
5. NPS Surveys,
6. Easy Localization,
7. Advanced Analytics with User Activity Feed,
8. Custom user segments,
9. Material Tagging and Easy Targeting,
10. No-code customization,
11. Advanced integrations.

2. Hotjar - In-Depth User Behavior Analysis

Hotjar is a user behavior analysis tool that goes beyond traditional analytics. It allows you to visualize user interactions with heatmaps, session recordings, and feedback polls. 

Hotjar's insights are invaluable for understanding how users navigate your product and pinpointing areas that need improvement. It helps you collect the necessary data and take actions accordingly, instead of trying to make guesses about the behavior of your users.

It is one of the top product discovery tools that product teams need.

With Hotjar:

You can record session videos and screen recordings. Hotjar also lets you do polls and surveys. You can also use it to see where your visitors click, which buttons they press the most, how far they scroll down, and what they do when they visit your site.

3. Amplitude - Dive into User Analytics

Amplitude is a robust product analytics platform that helps you dive deep into user behavior. It offers advanced analytics, cohort analysis, and retention tracking. 

With Amplitude, you can measure the impact of product changes, optimize user flows, and make data-driven decisions. Amplitude has a freemium version but if you want to get the best out of the product, you should be using these features as well:

• Amplitude produces predictive reports, available only with Growth and Enterprise plans.
• If you want to use Amplitude’s collaborative functionality, such as shared reports, SSO, and custom roles and permissions, you need to pay.
• With Amplitude's “engage” add-on, you can segment users based on their activity, and then send them targeted in-product messages to increase engagement.

4. Jira Product Discovery - Efficient Process Management

Jira Product Discovery is a powerful tool for managing the product discovery process efficiently. It provides a centralized platform for collaboration, task tracking, and project management. 

With Jira, you can create and prioritize product ideas, plan sprints, and ensure your team stays aligned throughout the discovery phase.

A product team without a good project tracking tool may have a hard time putting the necessary work into developing and improving a loved product.

Jira promotes its bug tracking. It is a function that enables you to get an overview of the bugs that are apparent in your products and services. By using this function’s template, you can capture, manage, and resolve the issues that get in the way by assigning them to the right person.

5. Mixpanel - Advanced User Analytics

Mixpanel is a powerful user analytics platform that provides detailed insights into user behavior. It enables you to track user journeys, perform funnel analysis, and gain a deep understanding of how users interact with your product. 

Mixpanel also offers A/B testing capabilities, helping you optimize your product features based on real user data.

Similar to Amplitude, Mixpanel also provides great insights into what the user is doing on your website as it tracks “events” rather than page views.

Mixpanel also works on a freemium model, but you can only track up to 1,000 users per month.

To move up to 25,000 monthly users, Mixpanel requires you to pay $89 per month, and there is also custom pricing for enterprise packages.

6. Pendo - Product Adoption and User Guidance

Pendo is an all-in-one product discovery and adoption platform that helps you understand and guide user behavior within your product. It offers in-app messaging, feature usage tracking, and user surveys. 

Pendo's insights and guidance tools make it easier to onboard new users, drive feature adoption, and reduce churn.

Pendo has a free plan called “Pendo Free“ for up to 1,000 monthly active users, one web and one mobile app. For bigger plans, Pendo doesn’t have a set pricing.

7. Qualtrics - Robust Survey and Feedback Platform

Qualtrics is a comprehensive survey and feedback platform that empowers you to collect, analyze, and act on customer and user insights. 

It offers a wide range of survey types, including NPS (Net Promoter Score) surveys, customer satisfaction surveys, and more. Qualtrics helps you gather data that is crucial for making informed product decisions.

8. Intercom - Customer Communication and Engagement

Intercom is a customer communication platform that helps you engage with users through targeted messaging, chat, and email campaigns. 

While primarily a communication tool, Intercom also provides valuable user engagement data that can inform your product discovery process. 

It allows you to communicate directly with users to gather feedback and guide them through your product.

According to user comments on Reddit and HelpCrunch, Intercom’s pricing can range between $74/month (only for newly established companies with under 5 employees) and $999/month. Also, some features are billed separately and cost an additional monthly fee.

• Starter Plan: $74/month for small businesses
  • Product Tours Add-On: $199/month
  • WhatsApp Add-On: $9/user
  • Surveys Add-On: $49/month
• Support Plan: Custom quotation upon request
• Engage Plan: Custom quotation upon request
• Convert Plan: Custom quotation upon request

To Sum Up

In this article, we discovered the very essence of product discovery software. 

These tools have become the compass and the chart, guiding product managers and development teams through the process of product improvement by providing them with all of the abilities necessary to understand users and create a product that meets their needs and expectations.

Product managers, armed with these software solutions, are one step ahead in meeting the ever-evolving user expectations. 

Product discovery strategies and tools will continue to evolve. New technologies, methodologies, and user behaviors will emerge, requiring adaptation and innovation. 

The tools we've explored are not static; they evolve in tandem with the challenges they seek to address.