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There are so many different idea management software options that making a shortlist of the best can be tricky. You want to centralize information, promote collaboration and track which are the best ideas to pursue - and need the right tool for the job. I've got you covered! In this post, I use my experience sifting through product ideas and using many different idea management platforms in complex products to share my picks of the best idea management software.

Why Trust Our Idea Management Software Reviews

We’ve been testing and reviewing idea management software since 2021. As product managers ourselves, we know how critical and difficult it is to make the right decision when selecting software.

We invest in deep research to help our audience make better software purchasing decisions. We’ve tested more than 2,000 tools for different product management use cases and written over 1,000 comprehensive software reviews. Learn how we stay transparent & our idea management software review methodology.

The Best Idea Management Software Solutions Comparison Chart

Here is a table where you can compare all the tools we just covered in the overviews. If you want to expand your research, we have more options below.

Tools Price
Yambla From $10/user/month (billed annually, min 500 users)
Miro From $10/user/month
FigJam by Figma From $3/user/month
Brightidea Pricing upon request
Ideawake Pricing upon request
Reveall From $24/month
Coda From $12/month/user
Google Workspace From $6/user/month
Canny From $400/month (unlimited users)
Idea Drop Pricing upon request
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How to Choose Idea Management Software

With so many different idea management solutions available, it can be challenging to make decisions on what idea management software is going to be the best fit for your needs.

As you're shortlisting, trialing, and selecting idea management software, consider the following:

  • What problem are you trying to solve - Start by identifying the idea management feature gap you're trying to fill to clarify the features and functionality the idea management software needs to provide.
  • Who will need to use it - To evaluate cost and requirements, consider who'll be using the software and how many licenses you'll need. You'll need to evaluate if it'll just be the product management professionals, or the whole organization that will require access. When that's clear, it's worth considering if you're prioritizing ease of use for all, or speed for your idea management software power users.
  • What other tools it needs to work with - Clarify what tools you're replacing, what tools are staying, and the tools you'll need to integrate with, such as accounting, CRM or HR software. You'll need to decide if the tools will need to integrate together, or alternatively, if you can replace multiple tools with one consolidated idea management tool.
  • What outcomes are important - Consider the result that the software needs to deliver to be considered a success. Consider what capability you want to gain, or what you want to improve, and how you will be measuring success. For example, an outcome could be the ability to get greater visibility into performance. You could compare idea management features until you’re blue in the face, but if you aren’t thinking about the outcomes you want to drive, you could be wasting a lot of valuable time.
  • How it would work within your organization - Consider the software selection alongside your workflows and delivery methodology. Evaluate what's working well, and the areas that are causing issues that need to be addressed. Remember every business is different — don’t assume that because a tool is popular that it'll work in your organization

Best Idea Management Software Reviews

Here’s a brief description of each idea management solution to showcase each tool’s best use case and some noteworthy features.

Best idea management software for collaborative and AI-assisted innovation

  • Free demo available
  • From $10/user/month (billed annually, min 500 users)
Visit Website
Rating: 5/5

Yambla is a SaaS platform focused on idea and innovation management within organizations. It provides a suite of tools for collecting, managing, and developing ideas which supports a culture of continuous improvement and rapid implementation.

Yambla is primarily used for collecting and developing ideas through targeted challenges and campaigns, facilitating collaboration through comments, suggestions, and voting, and recognizing contributors through leaderboards. It also simplifies the idea submission process, offers an AI pitch assistant to aid in idea development, and includes analytics and visualization tools to help track idea progress.

Yambla integrates with a variety of productivity and collaboration tools. Notable integrations include Microsoft Teams for communication, Microsoft SharePoint for document management, Google Workspace, and Miro for online collaborative whiteboarding. It also supports embedded submission widgets on websites to enable the collection of ideas from visitors.

Best idea management whiteboard software with templates

  • Free plan available
  • From $10/user/month
Visit Website
Rating: 4.8/5

Miro is a digital platform for collaboration and idea management, offering a versatile virtual whiteboard where teams can visualize their ideas with story maps, flowcharts, sticky notes, and wireframes. Its infinite canvas allows for a broad expression of thoughts, accommodating numerical data, images, videos, and brand elements.  A large library of templates is included and divided into various business functions and industries. This setup, combined with features for brainstorming and prioritizing such as voting and timers, positions Miro as a tool for managing and advancing product ideas and other projects.

Once ideas have been generated and sorted, teams can use the platform to map out their plans for how they'll build or improve their products. Miro also facilitates asynchronous collaboration, enabling team members to engage through comments and reactions at their convenience, which is ideal for remote or distributed teams. You can additionally use the software to track how many ideas your teams generate, how many are implemented, and how many are abandoned.

Several integrations are available to connect the system to your other product and project management systems. The software integrates with Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Slack, Google Workspace, Asana, monday.com, Confluence, Jira, Dropbox, OneDrive, Notion, Airtable, ClickUp, and Unito, among others. A free plan is available and paid plans start from $10 per user per month.

Best idea management tool for brainstorming and voting as a team

  • Free plan available
  • From $3/user/month
Visit Website
Rating: 4.7/5

FigJam is a digital whiteboard tool designed to facilitate collaborative brainstorming and idea generation. As a product of the popular design tool company Figma, FigJam is all about making it easy for teams to get their ideas out there, organize them, and make sense of them.

What sets FigJam apart from other idea management tools is its focus on collaboration and interactivity. It's not just about capturing ideas; it's about exploring them together as a team. And with its intuitive interface and fun features, it makes the whole process feel less like work and more like play.

One of the standout features of FigJam is its sticky notes. I know, I know, sticky notes are nothing new. But FigJam does them really well. You can color-code them, resize them, and easily move them around. It's like having an infinite, digital sticky note wall.

Another cool feature is their idea voting system. It's a simple, yet powerful way to get a sense of what ideas are resonating with the rest of your team.

Lastly, their cursor chat feature is also pretty interesting. It lets you have real-time, in-context conversations about the ideas on the board, making it easy to collaborate with your team members and keep those creative juices flowing.

FigJam also integrates seamlessly with Figma, which is a big plus if you're already using Figma for your design work. Other integrations include Asana, Dropbox, Figma, Google Drive, Microsoft Teams, Notion, Slack, Trello, and numerous tools for prototyping, user testing, and developer handoff.

Best idea management software with a native whiteboard feature

  • Free demo available
  • Pricing upon request
Visit Website
Rating: 4.3/5

Brightidea is an idea management software to collect, screen, evaluate, and develop ideas in product development. It has an idea box feature where employees can submit new ideas anytime.

Brightidea has a labs feature for facilitating design research for new products without installing a separate PLM software. This idea management tool also has an external innovation feature to help you explore ideas from outside sources like universities and startups.

Brainstorming is one of the best ways to gather ideas for new products and Brightidea has a native whiteboard feature to help you make brainstorming more productive. It has stickies you can use to take note of suggestions for new products.

Brightidea’s whiteboard has markers and pens that team members can use to illustrate ideas to make them easier to understand. It also allows participants to upload images to show other participants pictures of prototypes or features they want to add.

Brightidea offers customized pricing and a free demo upon request.

Best idea management software with customizable submission forms

  • 14-day free trial + free demo available
  • Pricing upon request
Visit Website
Rating: 4.5/5

Ideawake is an innovation management software to collect, evaluate, and implement ideas for new products. You can use it to allow team members to vote on ideas to gain the group’s consensus.

This innovation management software has custom scorecards you can use to ensure uniformity in judging new ideas. Ideawake also allows you to assign ideas for the review of subject matter experts to ensure that they get judged by qualified reviewers.

Ideawake is the best idea management software because it has customizable submission forms if you want to make idea submission more organized. With the help of Ideawake’s submission forms, you can ensure that submissions contain the same information to make assessing ideas more consistent.

The fields in Ideawake’s submission forms can help you filter submissions to make categorizing them easier.Ideawake integrates with other idea management tools like Microsoft 365, Slack, Trello, Dropbox, and Zoom.

Ideawake provides pricing information and a free demo upon customer request.

Best idea management software with built-in product discovery features

  • 14-day free trial
  • From $24/month
Visit Website
Rating: 3.5/5

Reveall is an idea management software that helps organizations capture, curate, and develop the best ideas across their teams. It provides an easy-to-use platform for collecting, organizing, and refining product ideas to turn them into successful products.

Users can quickly prioritize and review product ideas using its intuitive interface. The platform reduces the time required to get new product ideas ready for launch while improving organizational innovation. By streamlining the idea management process, the software enables teams to efficiently manage large projects without getting overwhelmed.

The voting tools allow teams to easily rank their favorite product concepts so they can focus on developing the most promising ones first. Its robust analytics capabilities provide valuable insights into which concepts have the most potential and which need additional refinement before launch.

The software's journey visualization feature can loop in customer insights to provide users with a visual overview of the progress of their ideas, enabling users to prioritize the best ideas for further exploration. Businesses can use this feature to compare different versions of an idea, which can be helpful when making decisions about which version should move forward. Additionally, users can view both current and past versions side-by-side to better understand how far an idea has come since its conception.

Best idea management software for triaging ideas

  • Free Plan Available
  • From $12/month/user

Coda is a cloud-based document editor to help team members collaborate on brainstorming and product development. You can use it to facilitate meetings, create an agenda, and take meeting notes. It has a workflow automation feature to automate simple tasks and give you more time to attend to critical projects.

Coda has a document sharing feature to ensure that team members have access to information needed in planning new products. Coda has an idea triage feature to help you evaluate ideas to isolate that one great idea for a new product.

Coda lets you categorize ideas to assign them to reviewers for further evaluations. It also has graphs to help product managers visually assess the status of ideas and understand the percentage of useful ideas submitted.

Coda has an idea submission template, so you know the date of submission of ideas and the reviewer’s name to create follow-ups on ideas that lack status updates.

You can connect Coda to a paid Zapier account to give you access to premium apps that can help you develop new products.

Coda has a free plan with limited features, while the pricing for paid plans starts at $12/month/user.

Best idea management software with video conferencing with collaborators

  • 14-day free trial
  • From $6/user/month

Google Workspace is a collection of productivity and collaboration tools that allows team members to contribute ideas in text documents, spreadsheets, presentations, or IRL by video or chat.

Google Workspace is cloud-based to give team members access to documents and other crucial files wherever they are. This makes it a great option for remote or hybrid teams. Because it’s free, you might want to combine it with other (paid) software for a more complete approach to idea management. Video conferences have become the norm as more companies turn to telecommuting and Google Workspace is the best idea management software if you want one to help you conduct video conferences with team members.

What’s great about Google Workspace is that it allows up to 100 participants to join a video meeting to gather as many team members as you want to collect all the ideas you need.

Google Workspace allows you to record meetings and store them in Google Drive so you can replay meetings and note ideas you might have missed.

Google Workspace is free to use.

Best idea management software with a feature request system

  • 14-day free trial + free version available
  • From $400/month (unlimited users)

Canny is an idea management software to help you collect, manage, and evaluate product feedback. It has a product roadmap feature with an idea ranking functionality to score projects and feature requests and help you prioritize projects. You can use Canny to monitor the status of projects to help you focus on product development stages experiencing bottlenecks.

Canny is the best idea management software for a feature request system. This request system provides you with a centralized location for feature requests from customers, stakeholders, and employees. It also gives you a means of reaching out to customers who made similar requests for further discussions. You can use Canny to check the profiles of request submitters to understand the target demographic of a new product.

Canny integrates with other product development and project management tools, including HubSpot, Salesforce, G Suite, Jira, and Zendesk.

Canny has a free forever plan with limited features, while the pricing of its paid plans starts at $400/month/up to 5 administrators and an unlimited number of contributors.

Best idea management software with a gamification feature

  • Free demo available
  • Pricing upon request

Idea Drop is an idea management software that helps you discover, evaluate, and execute innovative ideas for your product. It has a pattern recognition feature to detect similar ideas and encourage employees with the same ideas to collaborate. Idea Drop has a cloaking feature to make idea submission confidential by protecting the identities of those who submitted them.Competitions motivate employees to bring in new ideas, and Idea Drop has a gamification feature to help you take advantage of this.

Idea Drop allows you to build in rewards and challenges to encourage participants in bringing new ideas to the table. The software allows you to assign real-time innovation/idea scores, assign deadlines to team challenges, and track progress via a kanban-style workflow board.

Idea Drop provides pricing details and a free demo upon request.

Need expert help selecting the right Ideas Management Software?

We’ve joined up with Crozdesk.com to give all our readers (yes, you!) access to Crozdesk’s software advisors. Just use the form below to share your needs, and they will contact you at no cost or commitment. You will then be matched and connected to a shortlist of vendors that best fit your company, and you can access exclusive software discounts!

Other Idea Management Software

Here are a few more that didn’t make the top list, but worth considering if you would like to expand your research.

  1. Mural

    Best idea management software with a digital whiteboard & collaboration features

  2. Planbox

    Best idea management software with an idea portal + campaign management

  3. monday.com

    Idea management software with a digital whiteboard & collaboration features

  4. ClickUp

    Best idea management software for team collaboration and communication

  5. Wrike

    Best idea management with to-do lists, timelines, & collaboration features

  6. MindMeister

    Best idea management software for creating an innovation pipeline

  7. Zeda.io

    Best for customer-based idea management to prioritize feature requests

  8. Ignition

    Best idea management with idea submission & voting

  9. Walling

    Idea management management software for workspace visualization

  10. Smartsheet

    SaaS for work management and collaboration

  11. Viima

    Innovation management software for collecting and developing ideas

  12. Craft.io

    Best idea management software with a strategic roadmap feature

  13. Ideanote

    Innovation software for gathering, organizing, prioritizing, and developing ideas

  14. IdeaScale

    Innovation management solution for linking organizations to outside sources of ideas

  15. Asana

    Work management software for organizing teams and managing projects. 

If you still haven't found what you're looking for here, check out these tools closely related to idea management software that we've tested and evaluated.

Selection Criteria for Idea Management Software

Selecting the right idea management platform is a critical task that hinges on a detailed understanding of both the software's capabilities and the specific needs of your organization. I've personally researched and tested various idea management tools, and have developed a set of selection criteria based on functionality, user experience, and specific use cases. Here is how I evaluated and weighted each criteria to ensure that my recommendations were accurate, balanced, and informative.

Core Idea Management Software Functionality (25% of total weighting score): To be considered for inclusion on my list of the best idea management platforms, the solution had to fulfill common use cases:

  • Facilitating anonymous submissions to encourage uninhibited participation
  • Enabling idea categorization for streamlined organization
  • Supporting collaborative refinement of ideas through comments and discussions
  • Allowing community voting to gauge interest and prioritize ideas
  • Providing analytics for tracking the impact and effectiveness of submitted ideas

Additional Standout Features (25% of total weighting score): Identifying additional standout features is critical for distinguishing exceptional platforms from the good, focusing on innovative and unique functionalities that enhance the idea management process. This criterion seeks platforms that push beyond the standard feature set to offer capabilities that significantly improve user experience and outcome, such as:

  • Innovative Collaboration Features: Platforms that offer real-time editing or AI-driven suggestion capabilities for idea development.
  • Advanced Analytics Tools: Solutions with predictive analytics or trend spotting to foresee the potential success of ideas.
  • Unique Integration Options: Platforms with extensive or unique integrations, such as with specific industry tools or advanced project management software.
  • Exceptional Security Measures: Those offering advanced encryption, role-based access control, or compliance with international data protection regulations.
  • Gamification Elements: Solutions that incorporate gamification to increase engagement and participation through rewards or recognition systems.

Usability (10% of total weighting score): Usability is a key factor in ensuring that a platform is accessible and engaging for all users, aiming to provide a seamless experience that encourages regular interaction and contribution. This evaluation looks for software that strikes a balance between feature richness and user-friendly design.

  • Platforms must balance powerful functionality with intuitive design, ensuring features are accessible without extensive training.
  • Clear, logical navigation and the ability to customize dashboards and reports to suit different user needs.
  • A well-designed platform that encourages regular use and engagement.

Onboarding (10% of total weighting score): A smooth onboarding process is crucial for rapid adoption and realization of the platform's value, focusing on resources and support that enable easy setup and use. This criterion assesses the comprehensiveness and quality of onboarding materials and assistance provided to new users.

  • Prioritize platforms that offer comprehensive onboarding resources such as training videos, product tours, and template libraries.
  • Assess the availability of dedicated support during the onboarding phase, including live chat support, webinars, and interactive guides.
  • Consider the platform's scalability and the ease with which new users can be added and trained.

Customer Support (10% of total weighting score): Effective customer support enhances the user experience and ensures any issues are promptly resolved, maintaining the platform's value and utility over time. This evaluation considers the responsiveness, diversity, and quality of support options available to users.

  • Evaluate the responsiveness, availability, and knowledgeability of the customer support team.
  • Look for platforms that offer multiple support channels, including email, phone, live chat, and a comprehensive knowledge base.
  • Assess the quality of ongoing support and the platform's commitment to customer success post-purchase.

Value For Money (10% of total weighting score): Assessing value for money ensures that the investment in an idea management platform is justified by the features, support, and scalability it offers, providing a cost-effective solution for the organization's needs. This criterion compares the pricing and overall value proposition of different platforms.

  • Compare pricing structures across platforms, considering the features offered at each price point to ensure cost-effectiveness.
  • Evaluate the flexibility of pricing plans, including scalability options that match your organization's growth.
  • Consider any hidden costs, such as setup fees, additional modules, or integration costs.

Customer Reviews (10% of total weighting score): Customer reviews offer invaluable insights into the real-world performance and impact of a platform, highlighting strengths and areas for improvement from the user perspective. This evaluation sifts through user feedback to identify patterns and consensus on the platform's effectiveness and satisfaction levels.

  • Analyze feedback from current and past users to gauge satisfaction levels, focusing on reviews that mention ease of use, customer support quality, and the impact on innovation processes.
  • Pay attention to recurring themes in reviews, particularly concerning any challenges or limitations of the platform.
  • Assess the overall sentiment and satisfaction levels, giving weight to reviews that detail specific benefits or drawbacks.

This criteria framework supports a holistic approach to selecting idea management platforms, aligning software capabilities with organizational needs and user expectations. By focusing on these areas, buyers can confidently choose a platform that not only meets their immediate needs, but also supports long-term innovation and growth strategies.

As the idea management software landscape continues to evolve in 2024, several additional trends have emerged, each responding to the unique challenges and opportunities faced by organizations striving to enhance their innovation processes. Here are several key trends that not only reflect the changing nature of work, but also the increasing complexity of managing ideas in a way that maximizes their potential for impact:

  • Focus on Security and Compliance: With the rising concern over data privacy and intellectual property protection, idea management platforms are significantly enhancing their security features and compliance protocols. Encryption, secure access controls, and adherence to international data protection standards are becoming key factors for organizations, especially those in highly regulated industries.
  • Mobile Accessibility and Engagement: Recognizing the increasingly mobile nature of work, platforms are improving their mobile applications and features, ensuring that users can submit, review, and collaborate on ideas anytime, anywhere. This trend addresses the need for continuous engagement and the desire to capture ideas as they occur, regardless of the user's location.
  • Sustainability and Social Impact Features: As businesses become more conscious of their social and environmental impact, idea management tools are incorporating features to track and evaluate ideas based on their sustainability potential. This functionality aligns with the growing demand for innovations that contribute to corporate social responsibility goals.
  • Cross-Functional Idea Flow: To break down silos within organizations, new functionalities are being developed to facilitate cross-functional idea sharing and collaboration. This trend towards interdisciplinary innovation aims to leverage diverse perspectives and expertise, enriching the idea development process and uncovering opportunities that might otherwise be overlooked.
  • Personalization and AI-driven Insights: Platforms are increasingly leveraging AI to offer personalized insights and recommendations to users, based on their roles, past contributions, and areas of expertise. This trend towards personalization aims to enhance user engagement by making the idea management process more relevant and rewarding for individual participants.

The trends in idea management software for 2024 reflect a broader shift towards more intelligent, collaborative, and customizable tools, designed to meet the evolving needs of a diverse and distributed workforce.

As organizations continue to seek efficient ways to harness the creative potential of their employees and stakeholders, the features and functionalities of idea management platforms will likely continue to evolve, driving innovation and competitive advantage.

What is idea management software?

Idea management software is a type of platform that facilitates the collection, organization, and evaluation of ideas from various sources within an organization. It provides a structured and collaborative environment for employees, customers, or other stakeholders to submit, discuss, and develop ideas.

Idea management software typically includes features such as idea submission, collaboration tools, workflow management, and analytics to help organizations harness creativity, encourage innovation, and efficiently manage the entire idea lifecycle. The goal is to tap into the collective intelligence of a group or community and foster a culture of continuous improvement and innovation within the organization.

Features of Idea Management Software

Idea management software plays a crucial role in harnessing the collective intelligence of employees or stakeholders. Such platforms not only capture and organize ideas, but also facilitate their evaluation and implementation. When selecting idea management software, it's important to consider features that streamline these processes and enhance collaboration.

1. Intuitive User Interface: Ease of use ensures that all participants, regardless of their tech-savviness, can contribute ideas without barriers. A user-friendly interface encourages wider participation, making it easier to gather a diverse range of ideas.

2. Idea Submission Form: Customizable fields allow for the collection of specific information about each idea, such as its description, potential impact, and required resources. This helps in organizing ideas right from the start, making the evaluation process more efficient.

3. Collaboration Tools: Team interaction features enable contributors to discuss, refine, and improve ideas together. Collaboration is key to developing and enriching ideas, ensuring they are thoroughly vetted before implementation.

4. Categorization and Tagging: Efficient organization of ideas based on themes, departments, or any other relevant criteria. This feature makes it easier to sort and find ideas, facilitating better analysis and decision-making.

5. Voting and Rating Systems: Community feedback mechanisms allow users to express their support for ideas, helping to prioritize them based on collective interest or perceived value. This democratic approach ensures that the most popular and potentially impactful ideas rise to the top.

6. Workflow and Status Tracking: Progress monitoring lets users follow the development of an idea from submission to decision. Tracking the status of ideas keeps everyone informed and engaged in the process.

7. Idea Evaluation and Scoring: Structured assessment tools help in objectively analyzing the feasibility, impact, and alignment of ideas with organizational goals. This helps in selecting the ideas that are most worth pursuing.

8. Integration Capabilities: Compatibility with existing tools ensures that the idea management software can work seamlessly with other systems in use, such as email, CRM, or project management platforms. Integration is essential for efficient workflow and information exchange.

9. Analytics and Reporting: Insightful analytics provide a clear view of idea trends, participation levels, and the overall health of the innovation pipeline. Data-driven insights aid in making informed decisions about which ideas to implement.

10. Security and Privacy Controls: Robust protection of intellectual property and personal information is paramount, especially in a platform where potentially sensitive business ideas are shared. Strong security measures build trust among users and protect valuable assets.

Selecting the right idea management software involves looking beyond the basics to features that foster engagement, streamline the innovation process, and leverage collective intelligence. By focusing on these key features, organizations can effectively capture, organize, and evaluate ideas, transforming them into tangible outcomes that drive growth and innovation.

Benefits of Idea Management Software

By providing a structured platform to capture, discuss, and refine ideas, these idea management systems can help turn the creative potential of an organization's team into actionable strategies. For potential buyers considering such a system, understanding the primary benefits of idea management software can highlight the value it brings to users and the organization as a whole. Here are five key benefits of idea management software:

1. Enhanced Collaboration: Idea management software fosters teamwork by providing a shared space where employees can build on each other's ideas. This benefit leads to a more engaged workforce that feels valued and motivated to contribute, ultimately driving innovation from within.

2. Streamlined Innovation Process: These tools can simplify idea management by automating the collection, sorting, and evaluation of suggestions. Organizations can more quickly identify and implement valuable ideas, reducing the time from concept to execution and increasing agility.

3. Increased Idea Visibility: Idea management improves awareness of suggestions throughout the organization, ensuring good ideas are recognized and considered, regardless of where they originate. This democratization of idea sharing breaks down silos and leverages diverse perspectives for better problem-solving.

4. Data-Driven Decision Making: The software provides actionable insights with analytics and reporting tools that track the performance of ideas over time. By understanding trends and the impact of implemented ideas, businesses can make informed decisions that align with strategic objectives.

5. Scalable Innovation Management: These systems support growth by efficiently handling a large volume of ideas without losing quality in the process. As organizations grow, the system adapts, ensuring that the innovation process remains dynamic and inclusive.

Adopting idea management software can help create an environment where innovation is part of the organizational culture, employees are empowered to contribute, and decisions are made with a clear understanding of their potential impact. For organizations looking to harness the full potential of their workforce and ensure their competitive edge, investing in idea management software is a strategic move toward sustainable innovation.

Costs & Pricing for Idea Management Software

With a variety of options available, understanding the differences in functionality, support, and cost for idea management software can help software make an informed decision that aligns with their specific needs and budget constraints. Moreover, selecting the right plan and pricing option for idea management software is crucial for organizations aiming to enhance their innovation processes.

Idea management software typically offers several tiers of service, ranging from basic free versions to more advanced enterprise solutions, each designed to accommodate different scales of operation and feature requirements.

Plan Comparison Table for Idea Management Software

Plan TypeAverage PriceCommon Features
Basic$10 - $20 per user/monthIdea submission and tracking, basic analytics and reporting, limited collaboration tools, email support
Standard$20 - $50 per user/monthEnhanced collaboration tools, advanced analytics and reporting, integration capabilities, priority email and chat support
Premium$50 - $100 per user/monthComprehensive idea management and evaluation toolsm, full customization options, dedicated customer success manager, advanced security features
EnterpriseCustom pricingTailored integration and customization, scalable architecture for large user bases, 24/7 customer support and consulting services, advanced AI and machine learning capabilities
Free$0Basic idea submission, simple collaboration features, access to community forums for support, limited analytics

When choosing a plan, software buyers should carefully consider the scale of their innovation efforts and the specific features that will best support their goals. Balancing the need for advanced functionalities against budget constraints is key, as is selecting a plan that offers the flexibility to scale as the organization grows and its needs evolve.

Idea Management Software Frequently Asked Questions

Find answers to common questions other people ask about this topic.

What is idea management?

Idea management is the earliest stage of product development and the part of innovation management that deals with efficient and effective idea generation, as well as their evaluation and selection.

Although it might seem like something you could brush to the side, idea management can help a company attain and sustain a position of leadership in its industry. Therefore, it’s important you learn the general six-phase roadmap to understand how it works.

  1. Prepare the idea submission system
  2. Let ideators generate ideas
  3. Improve the quality of the ideas by filtering out the ones that work best
  4. Evaluate ideas and arrange them in project clusters
  5. Implement the ideas with the best feedback
  6. Deploy the new product

Learn more about how to revolutionize company innovation with idea management.

What is idea management used for?

Idea management is used to generate ideas on new initiatives and collect customer feedback. Therefore, it is common for these tools to have collaboration features, like in-app chat, voting, and collaborative judging.

How do I run an ideation workshop?

Collecting ideas for a product is not as simple as going around the room asking the same question over and over again. There are different ways to collect information, depending on how you want to focus the ideas that come out of the workshop.

Here are 5 frameworks that you can follow in an ideation workshop:

  1. Workflows to opportunities
  2. Affinity mapping
  3. Jobs-to-be-done
  4. How-might-we statements
  5. Impact vs. Effort

You can read more about it in our guide to killer ideation workshops.

What is the idea management process?

The idea management process is a series of steps you take to prioritize your product ideas effectively. This process starts with having the right idea management software that you can use as a centralized hub for communications. Then, you collect ideas from all stakeholders and choose a way in which you will prioritize them (you can use a feature prioritization framework). However, remember to stay consistent throughout your prioritization.

Finally, you’ll move into implementation and tracking.

What's Next?

Now that you know a bit more about how to use idea management tools to develop new ideas for products, I suggest you read about the idea management process to get more details related to that last FAQ. The article will explain the four steps you need to follow, plus five tips on how to get started.

If you want to learn about the latest software and tools to help your company excel, subscribe to The Product Manager today. 

By Ben Aston

Ben Aston is an online media entrepreneur and founder of Black & White Zebra, an indie media company on a mission to help people and organizations succeed.

Ben applies his expertise in design and strategy to enable businesses to deliver innovative products and services that delight customers. Ben is passionate about understanding customer needs through design research, identifying opportunities based on those insights, and empowering designers and technologists to create solutions. He is driven to develop and uncover new opportunities for clients, establishing strong connections with their customers through product solutions that create lasting value.