Example polls
Paste any of these into the message box in Slack.
Ranked poll. The core template. Five contenders, ranked, closing before planning.
/poll "Which feature should we build first next quarter?" "CSV export" "SSO login" "Offline mode on mobile" "Bulk edit" "Audit log" ranked close after 3 days
Premium: closing automatically
Close automatically: after 3 days
Choice poll. The quick version when a full ranking is overkill. Two picks each, anonymous.
/poll "Pick the two features that would help your customers most this quarter" "CSV export" "SSO login" "Offline mode on mobile" "Bulk edit" limit 2 anonymous
Premium: vote limits
AnonymousLimit votes: 2 per person
Survey (2 questions). A short survey with the ranking plus a free-text catch for anything missing.
/poll "Q3 prioritization" "Rank the backlog, then tell us what we missed." anonymous close after 3 days --- "Rank these by what we should build first" "CSV export" "SSO login" "Offline mode on mobile" "Bulk edit" ranked --- "What is missing from this list?" short text optional
Premium: surveys (several questions), closing automatically
AnonymousClose automatically: after 3 days
How to word it
Name each option the way your team already talks about it, in a few words: "CSV export", not "Improve data portability for admins". If an item needs context, link the spec in the message above the poll.
Keep the list to the real contenders. Four to seven is the range where people can rank carefully; past ten, the bottom half is noise. Cut anything already committed or already ruled out before you post.
Put the constraint in the question: "Which should we build first next quarter?" gets a different answer from "Which features do you like?"
Who to ask
Ask the people who see the trade-off from different angles: engineering for cost, support and sales for customer pain, product for strategy. Running the same poll in two channels and comparing the rankings is often more useful than one blended result.
Make it anonymous when seniority could skew the answers. A ranking where everyone copies the VP's order tells you nothing.
What to do with the results
Treat the ranking as input, not a verdict. Read the top three against effort: if the winner is three times the work of second place, say so and decide in the open.
Close it on a schedule (close after 3 days, Premium) so the result settles before the planning meeting. Then post the final order and what you are actually committing to, in the same thread. People who ranked will look for it.
The mistake people make
Using a plain multiple-choice poll. With unlimited picks, people tick everything they like and you get a flat list. If you don't want a full ranking, at least cap the picks with limit 2 (Premium) so each vote costs something.
Questions
How does Simple Poll decide the winner of a ranked poll?
It uses instant-runoff voting. If no option has a majority of first-place votes, the option with the fewest is eliminated and those voters' next choices are counted, until one option has a majority. See the help article in the sources.
Can voters see the ranking while the poll is open?
No. In a ranked poll, voters see the results only once the poll closes.
How many features can I put in a ranked poll?
Up to 5 options on Free and up to 45 on Premium. For ranking, fewer is better. Shortlist first if your backlog is long.
Can people suggest features I left out?
Not in the ranked question itself. Add a short text question in a survey (Premium), as in the third example, or run a separate open poll first to collect candidates.
Used by
Related
- How to create a ranked choice poll in Slack
In a ranked choice poll, each person puts the options in order of preference instead of picking one. Simple Poll counts the result with instant-runoff voting, so the winner is the option with the broadest support, not just the most first choices. Ranked polls work on every plan.
- What is ranked-choice voting?
Ranked-choice voting asks each voter to put the options in order of preference instead of picking just one. The term usually means instant-runoff counting: the last-placed option is eliminated round by round until one option has a majority.
- Slack polls for product teams
Product managers spend a lot of time getting a room to agree. A well-built poll does part of that work in Slack: it shows where people actually stand before the meeting, so the meeting can be about the disagreement instead of discovering it.
- Tool evaluation poll for Slack
When your team is choosing between software tools and the people who will use it every day should have a say.
- Launch date poll for Slack
When a release or launch needs a date the whole team can commit to, or a clear go or no-go before you ship.