It is an obvious fact that a key to your business is to provide the best customer service possible. What is not so evident is how to measure and capture your customer’s opinions about their experience. If you are in the type of business where you must guarantee service levels and expectations are defined by a Service Level Agreement, measuring your company’s performance is fairly easy and probably required. But for most that deal with walk-in traffic and new customers every day, knowing how your company rates compared to the competition isn’t so easy. This is where a customer service survey will prove helpful.
You’ve all seen some type of survey whether it’s a pointer to a website, a comment card at a table or a phone number to call. When customers use these mechanisms objectively the company is provided with valuable data. The type of survey to use will depend on what is desired to be captured. It might be a short questionnaire regarding a specific point or many questions that examine all aspects of the customer buying experience. A request for feedback may be made by a follow-up email, a phone call or take place immediately at the point of sale with a simple “how was our service today”. When carrying out these exercises watch out for these common survey mistakes.
- Make sure your survey targets the proper people or processes. Be as specific as possible especially when a number of your employees or departments may have had contact with the customer.
- Don’t let your employee influence the answers. If there is an emphasis to bring in high survey metrics customers may feel the pressure and score high out of sympathy. This type data will not be useful to you.
- Make the survey fits the product or service sold. For example, a car dealership will want to have one survey for the service department and another that pertains to their sales department.
- Don’t be a nuisance. Calling customers repeatedly for their input may only cause them to become annoyed and either refuse to return to the business or falsely fill out the survey.
- Provide a contact for follow-up. Ask if they would like to have someone to talk further about a problem they encountered.
- Be aware of customers that can’t be pleased. Some may have had a bad day and are looking for a place to take out their frustrations. Should a bad survey be received be sure to give your employees a chance to explain the situation.
Probably most important is to be sure to use the data. Based on your analysis make changes and recommendations in areas where there is consistent negative feedback. Then keep an eye on future surveys to ensure the changes are being effective.
Ted Saul provides private business consulting that assists startup and small businesses with organizational and planning needs. Ted holds an MBA from Regis University out of Denver Colorado. Ted can be reached at t.saul@juno.com, teds787 on Twitter and on Linkedin.