<disclaimer>
I co-host the SharePoint Pod Show with Nick Swan and Brett Lonsdale, who both work at Lightning Tools, but that doesn’t affect my feelings about their new service.
</disclaimer>
I want to just get the word out on the new service offering from Lightning Tools called Connect.LightningTools.com. Below is an excerpt describing the site (yes, I copied and pasted directly from the site):
“This site enables the users of Lightning Tools web parts and products to have an impact and provide feedback to drive the direction of development.
You can use this site to:
- get us to build web parts for you - free consultancy!
- give your feedback on existing products
- have an input with proposed features of existing products
- have input to specifications for completely new idea”
Ok, so why am I excited about this? I happen to work for a very large global company who often times gets access to provide direct feedback to product teams of various products. Most of the time, this isn’t an option for a lot of teams. Lightning Tools is offering this service so that they can connect with their clients on a different, more interactive level. As a customer, you have the ability to collaborate with the Lightning Tools product team to request features as well as help them design these new features. IMHO, this is something that is very progressive in the ISV market. Many times, you are just stuck with the product that you’ve bought with very little insight on what’s coming in the next version (not to mention having the ability to work directly with the teams to influence what gets put in the next version!).
My hope is that a lot of product vendors jump on board with this approach so that as a consumer, you can provide an impact to the next version of the tool or product that you’ve purchased. In all seriousness, kudos to the Lightning Tools team for stepping out there and allowing me as a consumer to help out with the brainstorming of new features and products!