Why feedback is the real voice of the customer - Customer Engagement Club

The Editor's Blog » Why feedback is the real voice of the customer

Back to Blogs Written on 20-Feb-2012 by stevieboy

Customer feedback is being increasingly recognised as critical to success. Customers like to be asked for their feedback (so long as they think it's leading somewhere other than down a black hole) and are increasingly giving that feedback whether they are asked for it or not. That feedback can be direct to the service provider or indirectly through social media sites such as Twitter, and increasingly through instant feedback mechanisms where smartphones are playing a key role in communication. So there really is no hiding place, and it makes sense for organisations to devise and implement coherent customer feedback strategies. The key for customers is that when they give feedback they feel that it means something tangible, that something will be done about it, and most importantly and especially if that feedback is negative, that the organisation is taking steps to redress the situation and make improvements going forward.

Recent research suggests that most organisations have some form of 'voice of the customer' strategy. Sounds good doesn't it? But where a lot of organisations are falling down is that while they may have an all singing all dancing VOC strategy they are not taking meaningful steps to actually listen to that customer voice. And some others, while thay may be listening to that voice, are doing precious little to take real action based on the feedback and insight they are gaining from their most important single asset - their customer base. We are all customers in our everyday lives and we know that organisations have more data and more realinsight into us and what makes us tick than ever before - enough to be able to take a single view of us, including on the feedback we give them.

So there really is no excuse now for organisations not to get their feedback act together. Those that do will benefit in the long run because a customer who feels understood and who feels that their comments and views mean something to the organisation they are spending their hard earned money with will inevitably give more of that hard earned money to the organisation that proactively asks for their opinion and then takes appropriate action. 'Closing the feedback loop' is another favourite industry phrase, but along with 'voice of the customer ' there is a real anger that we are doing little more than a box ticking exercise. The one I prefer is 'feeding back on the feedback' where we act on the feedback we receive and let our customers know that we have done so and give them real feedback on what resulted from them investing their time and energy with us.

This will be one of the key themes in our upcoming Customer Engagement Club Directors Forum around Customer Feedback in London on March 21, where there will be some hot case studies looking at organisations who are walking the feedback walk andf talking the feedback talk. It would be great to see you there. To register just go the the home page of our website www.customerengagementclub.com

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Tags: customer engagement,customer service,customer feedback,voice of the customer,closing feedback loop directors forums

Comments

written on 20-Feb-2012
Guy Letts [http://www.customersure.com] says:
Steve

You've hit the nail on the head, this is so important. When I was running a customer service department, with overall responsibility for customer experience, we tried so many things to improve customer satisfaction. All sensible and all very commonly preached amongst service professionals, but the only thing that made a difference was when we started doing what you've described here.

These simple steps began delivering measurable, year on year improvements in satisfaction:

1. We checked for satisfaction with short, fast questionnaires, asking only about things that were important to customers. (Never 'where did you hear about us?', or 'what newspaper do you read?'...)

2. We followed up on every response. Some replies didn't need further contact with the customers, some were just praise to share around and celebrate, some needed immediate action and pre-emptive goodwill gestures.

3. The SINGLE most important factor, apart from taking action, was showing the customer comments to EVERYONE, allowing them to get on and solve any issues as well as learning how their actions made customers feel.

The principles behind this are:

- customers are individuals who are won and lost one at a time;
- service is delivered by people who need information and freedom to use their initiative.

The results were so dramatic that I left my job and set up a company to bring to market some software to support this process. There's much available on the market to get the feedback, but hardly anything supports the follow-up, without which you might as well not bother.

Maybe in your next post you could cover the flawed logic and counter-productive waste of time that constitute annual satisfaction surveys!
written on 23-Feb-2012
KarineDM says:
I completely agree with your post Steve! A voice of the customer programme isn’t just the technology you buy, the best practices you implement, the surveys you send… Listening rather than hearing, and responding in a way that’s meaningful to your customers is the only path to a truly differentiated customer experience. This means the entire organisation has to care, not because they have to but because they want to, because it makes sense that dealing with happy customers is easier for everyone and ultimately more profitable for the bottom line. A great way to build an effective closed-loop program is to start with the end results: what are you aiming for? To stop customers from churning, to encourage positive word of mouth, to publicise your actions and let everyone know you care, to grow revenues of course… Once you prioritise these objectives, designing an action-oriented, closed-loop programme becomes much clearer, and you can drive (and measure) a positive ROI very quickly. Claire Sporton, Director, Customer Experience Management at Confirmit, will share some of these thoughts and best practices at the Customer Engagement Club Directors Forum around Customer Feedback in London on March 21, and I look forward to a great event as always! Karine Del Moro, Marketing Director, Confirmit.

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The Editor's Blog » Why feedback is the real voice of the customer

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