Validate is a beta offering that's available to a subset of Pendo customers. For these customers, the Validate page is accessed from the left-side navigation. If you're on a smaller screen, the page can be found by choosing More in the left-side navigation and then selecting Validate from the dropdown menu.
Validate helps you justify product investments by gathering supporting evidence from your visitors for product initiatives and testing solution ideas. Create product Ideas in the Validate page of Pendo, add votes to these ideas, and capture real responses from your target audience using Idea Tests. An Idea Test allows you to show up to three ideas to a segment of visitors, in-app, to help you understand what matters most to them. Ideas can be pain points, problems to solve, feature requests, or opportunity areas.
Permissions
You have the following roles to choose from that affect how you use Validate:
| Role | Validate Permissions | With Guide Creator Permissions |
| Administrator | All permissions and the ability to invite and edit other team members. | |
| Validate Manager | Create, edit, and delete ideas; add and remove votes from ideas. | Create and publish idea tests. |
| Validate Contributor | Create ideas; edit the title, description, app, and cover image; delete their own ideas; add and remove their own votes. |
Edit User Permission Settings by navigating to Settings > Users, selecting the user from the list, and then selecting Edit User.
View and filter ideas
View ideas in the Validate page of Pendo, which you can find in the left-side navigation. In the Ideas tab, you can find all existing ideas and the following information about these ideas depending on the columns you choose for the table.
- Title. The descriptive name given to the idea.
- Status. Where the idea is in your development process.
- Effort. The expected time, money, and other resources to fulfill an idea.
- Impact. The predicted value that the fulfilled idea will have on the business and customer base.
- Apps. The applications that the idea relates to.
- Product Area. The Product Area that the idea relates to, or “No Product Area” if none was assigned.
- Created By. The user that originally created the idea.
- Created Time. The date and time that the idea was originally created.
- Last Updated By. The user that last updated the idea.
- Last Updated Time. The date and time that the idea was last updated.
- Votes. The number of votes that an idea received.
- Account Votes. The number of Accounts that voted on an idea.
To customize columns, select the Manage Columns icon in the top-right corner of the list. In the window that opens, you can add, remove, and move columns in the table.
To view the details of an individual idea, select the name of the idea from the Ideas table, under the Title column. The details of the idea open in a slide-out on the right-side of the page.
Select the Votes tab to view the votes added to the idea on behalf of your customers. For information on adding votes, see Add Votes to an idea, below.
Using the global filters at the top of the page, you can filter by: segment, timescale, Product Area, and Status.
Create a new idea
To create a new idea, navigate to the Validate page from the left-side navigation and:
1. Select Create Idea in the top-right corner of the page.
2. Enter information about your idea in the Description.
3. Choose the appropriate Product Area (optional).
4. Select Create Idea in the bottom-right.
The idea then appears in your ideas table in the Validate page.
If you’re an internal user with admin permissions, you can also add Effort and Impact ratings after an idea is created. This data is used in the Analysis tab to help you prioritize what to build next.
Select the name of the idea under the Title column of the Ideas table to open the details of the idea. The details open in a slide-out on the right-side of the Validate page.
Add votes to an idea
To add votes to an idea on behalf of your visitors, navigate to the Validate page in the left-side navigation and open the appropriate idea by selecting its title in the Ideas table. If the idea doesn’t yet exist, follow the instructions under Create a new idea, above.
For information on how to view the details of an individual idea, see View ideas, above. Once you’ve opened an idea, select Add a Vote at the bottom of the idea, or the thumbs up icon at the top of the idea details slide-out.
In the Add a Vote window that appears, select a Visitor from the dropdown menu and then Add a Vote at the bottom.
Check that the vote has been added by opening the Votes tab of the idea.
Create idea tests
You can present a subset of ideas to your target visitors, in-app, to gather feedback from them. Use idea tests to understand the demand for your product initiatives and to justify product investments.
To create a new test, navigate to the Validate page in the left-side navigation and:
1. Select Validate Ideas in the top-right of the page. This opens the Create Idea Test form.
2. Enter an Idea Test Name. This name is for your internal reference.
3. Select which application you want to launch the test in.
4. Choose the Guide Theme you want to use, and then Next Step in the bottom-right of the form.
5. On the next screen, provide a Title and Description for the test. This is what your target customers see.
6. Select up to three Ideas you’d like to validate with your target customers from the Choose Ideas dropdown menu, and then Next Step in the bottom-right of the form.
7. On the next screen, choose a segment from the Select Segment dropdown menu, and then select Next Step in the bottom-right of the form.
8. On the next screen, choose a start date and time for the test using the dropdown menus.
9. To add an end date and time (optional), toggle on When should the Idea Test end? and choose a date and time using the dropdown menus.
10. Select Save and Exit in the bottom-right of the form. This takes you to the details page for the test, which is in Guides.
11. Use Preview in the test details to review the text in your application.
View and launch idea tests
If not already open, you can find, open, and launch your tests either from the Validate page. In the Idea Tests tab of the Validate page, you can see a list of existing tests and the following information about these tests depending on the columns you choose for the table.
- Test Name. The descriptive name given to the test.
- Test Status. Whether the test is in a Draft or Published state.
- Published. If published, how long ago the test was published.
- Ideas. The number of ideas included in the test.
- Results. A link to the results of the test.
- App. The application that the test relates to.
- Created Time. The date and time that the idea was originally created.
To customize columns, select the Manage Columns icon in the top-right corner of the list. In the window that opens, you can add, remove, and move columns in the table.
To see more details of the test, including who created it, when it was last updated, and its results, you can either:
- Select the name of the appropriate test under the Test Name column.
- Select View Results next to the appropriate test under the Results column.
Idea tests also live alongside guides in Pendo. You can open the appropriate test from the Guides Overview page as you would a normal guide.
Launch the test as you would with any other guide. Set your target segment, scheduling, and conversion. When you’re ready, set the poll to Public to launch it to your target audience. For more information, see Creating a Guide.
Note: Although an idea test is a type of guide, and can be found in the Guides page, alongside your other guides, you can view the results of your tests in the Validate page. For instructions, see View your test results in this article.
View test results
As with viewing and launching your tests, you can view results of your tests from both the Validate page and the Guides page. To view the detailed results of your test, find and open your test, and then:
- In the Guide Metrics tab, review the counts of views and clicks.
- In the Responses tab, review the responses to your test.
Compare and prioritize ideas
We also offer the ability to compare and prioritize ideas under the Analysis tab in the Validate page. This allows you to make decisions about your next product discovery or what to build next based on an aggregate of ideas.
Choose different segments at the top of the page. You can also set a date range by toggling off the All Time option and choosing from the options in the dropdown menu.
In the Top Ideas tab, you can view the most popular ideas based on either Votes, Accounts, or Revenue using the dropdown menu above the graph. The Revenue is the value that you pass into Pendo through the customer value metadata field. You can include up to 100 of the top ideas in this graph, included in increments of 5, 10, 20, 50, or 100. Choose how many ideas to include using the Limit dropdown menu.
In the Prioritize Ideas tab, you can view the proposed priority of ideas based on Effort (x-axis) and Impact (y-axis). Use this matrix as a decision-making tool for deciding what to focus on next. Uncover low effort, high impact “quick wins” alongside low impact ideas that would be better to deprioritize.