There's a strange kind of feedback that hurts more than criticism.
It's the feedback you didn't ask for. The feedback that wasn't sent to you at all.
I remember finding a thread about my product by accident. No tags. No mentions. Just users talking to each other.
They weren't angry. They weren't dramatic. They were... resigned.
They'd already accepted that the thing bothering them probably wouldn't be fixed. So they'd adapted. Or worse — they'd moved on.
What surprised me wasn't what they said. It was how clear they were.
They described the problem better than any ticket we'd ever received. They explained exactly where the friction was. And they'd been living with it for months.
I hadn't missed the feedback because I didn't care. I missed it because it never came through the channels I was watching.
Here's the uncomfortable truth: Some of the most important feedback never reaches you directly.
It lives in side conversations. In comparisons. In quiet decisions to stop using your product.
You won't find it in dashboards. You'll find it where people talk honestly — when they think you're not listening.
This is Founder FM. Build with your ears open.