How to share a public product roadmap (for free)
Make a simple public roadmap with three stages (Planned, In progress and Completed), let people vote on what is coming, and collect ideas in the same place. In Probed the ideas board and public roadmap are free on every plan, and feedback forms come with Premium, so you don't need a separate tool.
Why a public roadmap is worth it
Most early-stage founders hide their roadmap, worried it sets expectations they cannot meet. But a private roadmap means every customer asks the same question one at a time, and you answer it one at a time forever.
A public roadmap flips that. It shows people you are listening, gives them something to look forward to, and quietly answers is this product still being worked on? — the question that decides whether someone sticks around.
What to put on it (and what to leave off)
Keep it to three stages:
- Planned: what you’ve decided to do next.
- In progress: what you’re working on now.
- Completed: recently released, so the roadmap doubles as a changelog.
Before anything reaches Planned, let people post ideas and vote on them on an ideas board, and let them vote on roadmap items too. The most-wanted requests rise to the top on their own.
What to leave off: hard dates. Use stages, not deadlines. You get all the trust without boxing yourself into a calendar.
Collect feedback right next to it
A roadmap is only half the loop. Pair it with a place for customers to actually talk to you — see how to talk to your customers without a help desk — so a feature request becomes a conversation, not a form submission that disappears.
If you are weighing a dedicated community platform for this, Probed vs Circle covers the chat-first versus content-first trade-off.
Getting started
- Turn on the ideas board and public roadmap in your Probed space. The roadmap’s stages are Planned, In progress and Completed.
- Seed it with five to ten things you already know you are doing.
- Share the link publicly: in your app, your emails, your bio.
- Move cards as work progresses, and let people vote.
A roadmap you keep current is one of the cheapest trust-builders you have.
Common questions
Is a public roadmap a good idea for a small startup?
Yes, with light guardrails. Keep dates vague (use stages, not deadlines) and your roadmap becomes a trust and feedback engine. The main risk, over-promising, is solved by showing direction rather than commitments.
What is the difference between a roadmap and a changelog?
A roadmap shows what is coming and what you are considering; a changelog records what already shipped. A good public roadmap includes a Completed stage, so it doubles as a lightweight changelog.