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Measuring Customer Satisfaction

 The Managing  Director of a technology service company was speaking at a recent conference on customer satisfaction and said: "I pay €5,000 for an advertisement, and I don’t ever know what the return is. If I could be better at managing my customers' satisfaction, there would be more add-on business and I would lose fewer customers – At present, I don't even know if they are considering another supplier".

Do you ever think like that - if so, how do you find out how your customers feel about you? Do you really want to know, since you might have to fix something you didn't know was broken? 

The remainder of this issue summarises some key issues for consideration in measuring your customers satisfaction.

A Structured Approach is Critical
Objectives:
Businesses conduct customer satisfaction surveys for many reasons. Clear objectives need to be set before commencing the process. The primary ones usually tend to be:
  • To determine if customers are unhappy and considering moving to a competitor
  • To establish ways for improving the service and value provided to the customer
  • To seek additional business from current customers
Sampling:
For consumer surveys, a good rule of thumb is to regularly sample the views of 1% of customers. It is important to ensure that consistency is maintained as results may vary during sales or between weekends and weekdays as the customer profiles may be different for each period. Some retail companies like to sample customers who frequent different areas of the store (Meat counter vs the bakery or the wine section).

For B2B, the considerations are different – do you wish to lose any key customers? For this reason many companies regularly survey that group of customers representing 80% of overall business revenue.


Survey Design:
The classic steps involved in a customer service performance benchmark project would typically involve:
  • Identifying the key drivers of customer satisfaction.
  • And for each key driver:
    • Establishing separate ranking and weighting factors
    • Measuring customer perception
    • Measuring competitor performance
    • Setting minimum and desired benchmark ratings
  • Periodic reporting of performance vs. benchmarks and competitors
The development and design of a suitable questionnaire ideally should involve the key internal customers who will use the results. A workshop format often works well. The more input from the internal customer then the better will be the final results.

The following factors should be considered when designing the survey:
  • Multiple choice and single choice questions
  • Open questions (Useful for measuring perceptions, or for determining reasons for specific actions such as moving to a competitor). 
  • A post survey classification process to identify trends from open questions
  • Unprompted and prompted questioning  to probe the reasons for specific answers
  • Stratification to identify different trends among various sub-groups
Data Collection:
Incentives often work to encourage participants to complete and respond to surveys. In the case of benchmarking, the best incentive is to offer a complimentary copy of the survey to each participant.

Depending on a number of factors, different data collection methods may be needed.
  • Telephone
This is an excellent method where results are needed in a short time-span; Also useful for recruiting qualified respondents for different survey segments or strata to ensure adequate quotas and sample sizes. Data collection can also be readily done by telephone for surveys of up to 20 questions.
  • Mail
Used mainly for large volume or complex consumer surveys.
  • Email or Web Micro Site
Increasingly being used for complex B2B surveys where respondents have already been recruited by telephone.

Analysis & Reporting:
On completion of the data collection, the data needs to be analysed and formatted in a report for presentation to management. Various software packages are available to assist with this.

Reports can be in hardcopy, softcopy with and without graphics. If open questions are involved, these should be category coded prior to preparing a report.

In-House vs External
One apparent advantage of an in-house survey is that you can listen to individual customers and respond flexibly to their feedback. A disadvantage is that you run the risk of an inbuilt distortion of the results.

With an external survey, customers may be more honest if they know the are dealing with a third party. Also having the survey done externally ensures that it gets done regularly and on time.

  Four Key Steps for Success:
  1. Keep the questionnaire simple (10-15 questions)
  2. Repeat regularly to identify trends
  3. Benchmark against competitor performance
  4. Listen to customer feedback and take relevant remedial actions
Case Study:
The following is an example of a successful project we have recently completed:
 
Sales Lead Generation
Client:    Data Security Service Provider               
The project involved profiling companies to determine if they have a need for a security software solution. Each positive result was classified into the following categories:
  • Consultant meeting request
  • Consultant phone call request
  • Information request
Requests for a meeting or phone call from a consultant was 38%. Opt-in email permission was obtained for  67% of qualified decision makers contacted. These will receive periodic information in the form of e-newsletters and new product information.
         
   
   
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