Services
75
gestions for lacy, barely-there things based on some browsing their parents did in anticipation of Valentine’s Day?
Our opinion is that a committed service provider needs to make the decision to actually serve its customers’ interests—not just seem to serve them. So modulate your use of online anticipatory technology.
Steer your company practices away from that creepiness line.
Using Tools to Gather Information About Your
Customers’ Experience
There are many tools available to help you build the viewpoint of your customers into each of your products and services. Consider making use of one or more of the following: mini-customer surveys (‘‘quizzes’’), in-depth surveys, and possibly secret shopper services to gather information about the typical customer experience.
In-House ‘‘Quizzes.’’ An on-site, three-to-seven-question mini-survey, or ‘‘quiz,’’ tends to yield a very high participation rate. This rate is typically much higher than for a survey sent after customers have returned home and much higher than a full-length survey, whether offered onsite or later.
In-Depth Surveys. In-depth surveys can be useful to any company, no matter how small. If your company is large enough to generate survey data of some magnitude, these surveys should be administered and analyzed scientifically. This may be best done in collaboration with a specialized outside service. However you decide to handle them, be sure to remain involved in their design and administration, because there’s no point in a survey that gives you plenty of answers—but to the wrong questions! Consider the following points:
? A survey should reflect your most important questions about customer likes, dislikes, and needs. A good survey question is clearly worded and directly explains what you are trying to find out.
76
Exceptional Service, Exceptional Profit
? A survey should include free-form text fields to identify novel responses that you may not have even considered and to offer your customers an opportunity to express themselves.
? Questions and introductory material on a survey should be designed to give you meaningful responses. Asking a customer to be a mathematician (‘‘Estimate your chances of returning to our store this month in terms of percentage of 100 . . .’’) will create confusion and frustration. Asking your customer several individual questions and only then getting around to asking for an overall rating is the exact wrong order, and invalidates the overall rating. Ask for the overall rating first , since it’s the single most important rating, reflecting a gut reaction.
Concluding your survey with language such as ‘‘Thank you so much for entrusting us with your business!’’ helps you to end up with customers who are on your side, but don’t use this flowery language as an intro—it’ll skew your rating. Don’t use rating categories like ‘‘excel-lent’’; ‘‘excellence’’ is essentially undefinable, so look for something that is based on your customer’s own experience. ‘‘Exceeded expectations’’
is okay as the wording for your top rating category, or consider calling your top rating something emotive like ‘‘Loved it!’’
? Two questions that are especially useful proxies for loyalty are
‘‘intent to return’’ and ‘‘willingness to recommend’’ your business. Top scores in these two areas are strong indicators of a loyal customer.
? As you might suspect from where you’ve been with us so far, in our experience the number of so-called ‘‘top box’’ scores (the highest raters, especially highest raters on the key ‘‘intent to return’’ and ‘‘willingness to recommend’’ questions) you receive on your surveys is more important to your brand than the average or overall satisfaction score you get by tabulating all your surveys. In other words, customers who rate you in the absolute top category are the ones who are
75
gestions for lacy, barely-there things based on some browsing their parents did in anticipation of Valentine’s Day?
Our opinion is that a committed service provider needs to make the decision to actually serve its customers’ interests—not just seem to serve them. So modulate your use of online anticipatory technology.
Steer your company practices away from that creepiness line.
Using Tools to Gather Information About Your
Customers’ Experience
There are many tools available to help you build the viewpoint of your customers into each of your products and services. Consider making use of one or more of the following: mini-customer surveys (‘‘quizzes’’), in-depth surveys, and possibly secret shopper services to gather information about the typical customer experience.
In-House ‘‘Quizzes.’’ An on-site, three-to-seven-question mini-survey, or ‘‘quiz,’’ tends to yield a very high participation rate. This rate is typically much higher than for a survey sent after customers have returned home and much higher than a full-length survey, whether offered onsite or later.
In-Depth Surveys. In-depth surveys can be useful to any company, no matter how small. If your company is large enough to generate survey data of some magnitude, these surveys should be administered and analyzed scientifically. This may be best done in collaboration with a specialized outside service. However you decide to handle them, be sure to remain involved in their design and administration, because there’s no point in a survey that gives you plenty of answers—but to the wrong questions! Consider the following points:
? A survey should reflect your most important questions about customer likes, dislikes, and needs. A good survey question is clearly worded and directly explains what you are trying to find out.
76
Exceptional Service, Exceptional Profit
? A survey should include free-form text fields to identify novel responses that you may not have even considered and to offer your customers an opportunity to express themselves.
? Questions and introductory material on a survey should be designed to give you meaningful responses. Asking a customer to be a mathematician (‘‘Estimate your chances of returning to our store this month in terms of percentage of 100 . . .’’) will create confusion and frustration. Asking your customer several individual questions and only then getting around to asking for an overall rating is the exact wrong order, and invalidates the overall rating. Ask for the overall rating first , since it’s the single most important rating, reflecting a gut reaction.
Concluding your survey with language such as ‘‘Thank you so much for entrusting us with your business!’’ helps you to end up with customers who are on your side, but don’t use this flowery language as an intro—it’ll skew your rating. Don’t use rating categories like ‘‘excel-lent’’; ‘‘excellence’’ is essentially undefinable, so look for something that is based on your customer’s own experience. ‘‘Exceeded expectations’’
is okay as the wording for your top rating category, or consider calling your top rating something emotive like ‘‘Loved it!’’
? Two questions that are especially useful proxies for loyalty are
‘‘intent to return’’ and ‘‘willingness to recommend’’ your business. Top scores in these two areas are strong indicators of a loyal customer.
? As you might suspect from where you’ve been with us so far, in our experience the number of so-called ‘‘top box’’ scores (the highest raters, especially highest raters on the key ‘‘intent to return’’ and ‘‘willingness to recommend’’ questions) you receive on your surveys is more important to your brand than the average or overall satisfaction score you get by tabulating all your surveys. In other words, customers who rate you in the absolute top category are the ones who are
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