A Royal Road to Listening to Your Customers

Aug 21, 2019 | Blog

Subscribe

Stay up to date with the latest CX expert tips and news.

Crucial Step of Listening to Customers

According to research by Oracle, 86% of consumers will pay more for a better customer experience. Increased competition is forcing companies to differentiate through the experience they provide to customers. That’s why more and more companies are investing in customer experience projects or increasing resources. If you are aware of the importance of managing customer experience but not sure where to start, this post is for you. CX management starts with listening to customers carefully.

In an ever-changing world, customers and their expectations also change. As Peter Drucker states, “if you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it.” You may have even heard the famous quote from Henry Ford, “If I had asked what people wanted, they would have said faster horses.” Not everyone could ask for what they have not yet experienced. But if you listened to their needs, you would have probably learned they wanted a fast, safe, smooth, and continuous traveling. To understand these needs, first, you need to listen to your customers and know their satisfaction level to manage their experiences. Dr. Ernesto Sirolli explains in his TED talk that listening is essential when you want to change something. It seems easy, but unfortunately, most companies still don’t have a mature Voice of Customer program.

Start with the Strategy

Before implementing a VoC program, it is crucial to building a strategy that fits and supports the overall growth strategy. Beginning with top management, gaining the trust and support of all related departments is a top priority in delivering exceptional customer experiences. Start by defining these four key points.

First building block: Listening 

Building a robust voice of customer listening design is an essential first step in a VoC program. It is essentially made of four steps:

1. Setting the right metrics. For measuring customer experience, define which metrics you will measure in each touch point and/or journeys. Based on my professional expertise, start with using the Net Promoter Score for the company’s performance and Customer Satisfaction Score for touch points. Customer Journey Score is significant for customer experience allowing you to see an end to end experience for each specific lifetime of the customer. Let’s look at the two widely used metrics and how to use them in a VOC program

a) NPS: Reichheld found the Net Promoter Score in 2003. Basically, you ask your customers how likely they would promote your brand to their friends and family. You calculate the result by Promoters ratio (9-10 scores) – and Detractors Ratio (0-6 scores). NPS became popular because it has the highest correlation with business metrics such as growth. It is a tool to leverage customer experience; it should not be your company’s primary goal. 

b) CSAT: Customer satisfaction score is generally used after a transaction. For example, after a customer’s activity with the call center, after or during a branch visit or while using the mobile application. Companies want to know the satisfaction ratio based on that specific transaction. An example question might be: How would you rate your overall satisfaction with the [goods/service] you received? While the respondents use a scale from 1 to 5; 1: Highly unsatisfied, 5: Highly satisfied.

2. Defining Touch Points: After you decide on these metrics, you must define which touch points you are going to measure. You can think beyond the call center, branch, or digital channels. Some other essential touch point measurements include; invoice satisfaction, agent satisfaction, or IVR (Interactive Voice Recognition) satisfaction. A touch point where there is a high volume of customer interaction is a good place to start. 

3. Choosing the Right Channel: There are a lot of channels for measurement that you can use like Face to Face, IVR, SMS, E-mail, CATI, or Web link. You should pick the right one based on which metrics you will use and what your customers’ preferences are. The key is to make the measurement experience natural and part of the actual transaction. Measuring on the same channel is a good practice. For example, if the customer did the transaction in the mobile channel, collecting the feedback right at that point in the mobile. Similarly, if it is a phone transaction, an end of message survey with IVR would be most natural. If the channel is not a direct channel, like a store or branch transaction, then SMS or IVR might be good options. Scores might differ based on your channel. Do not change the channel in the middle of the year and be aware that scores also might change if the channel changes.

4. Tracking the Results: Tracking and improving your performance is key in delivering exceptional customer experiences. Both front line employees and the customer experience managers need to track the results. Alterna CX provides role-based dashboards for different levels in an organization. When store/branch managers can track their performance, customer experience managers can oversee all the store/branch journeys.

Organizations can immediately start getting insights right after the activation of a listening mechanism. They can have a great preliminary view of their customer experience performance and trends. Once the listening part of the Voice of Customer Program is up and running, the next step is to add a mechanism for ‘closing the loop’ so that feedback turns into action. To read more on the topic here is an article on Real-Time Feedback through Continuous Improvement Loop.

 

 

Related Resources

Benefits of AI-Enhanced CX Management Systems

by | Apr 12, 2023 | Blog | 0 Comments

Cross-functional projects, listening to customers, understanding consumer insights, closing the loop are the top phrases used over and over again ad nauseam. However,...

Predictive Customer Analytics

Best Real-World Examples for Predictive Customer Analytics

by | Nov 17, 2022 | Blog | 0 Comments

From the birth of civilization until 1900, beneficial knowledge doubled every hundred years approximately. Following World War II, these intellectually fertile periods...

Close the loop

Don’t Ghost Your Customers! Close the Loop

by | Oct 11, 2022 | Blog | 0 Comments

Do you try to win your customers back with a free item or discount when they are unhappy with the service agent’s attitude? Do you consider to bolster staff training?...

Three Unique Ways to Boost Customer Retention

Three Unique Ways to Boost Customer Retention

by | Aug 27, 2022 | Blog | 0 Comments

What does Customer Retention Mean with Today's CX Expectations? Let's say you’ve decided to watch one of your favorite Netflix series on a quiet weekend evening at...

Customer Obsession

Customer Obsession: Vital Component of Growth

by | Aug 3, 2022 | Blog | 0 Comments

What is Customer Obsession? Before pointing out the connection between customer obsession and sustainable business growth, let’s agree on the terminology. In lots of...

sentiment and emotion analysis

Going Beyond Sentiments: Emotion Analysis

by | Jun 28, 2022 | Blog | 0 Comments

Emotions do matter: Sentiment and Emotion Analysis You have done everything you can to please your customers. In every aspect, your team of professionals provided the...

CSAT vs NPS vs CES Customer Experience Metric Selection

Customer Experience Metric Selection

by | May 30, 2022 | Blog | 0 Comments

CSAT vs NPS vs CES: The Complete Comparison The first step before deep diving into customer experience metric selection is to understand the main areas to address when...

Four Areas to Address When Measuring Customer Experience

Four Areas to Address When Measuring Customer Experience

by | May 24, 2022 | Blog | 0 Comments

Measuring Customer Experience Measuring customer experience gives companies the opportunity to determine whether their customers have a problem and understand how to...

CX Signals and Slack Pair for a Perfect Fusion in Organizational Culture

CX Signals and Slack Pair for a Perfect Fusion in Organizational Culture

by | Apr 25, 2022 | Blog | 0 Comments

Slack has come a long way since its inception back in 2009.  Currently, users send over 1.5 billion messages per month. According to Slack statistics from 2021, 88,000...

Request a Demo

Seeing is believing

Learn how to apply AI to analyze all the various CX ”signals” generated by your customers via surveys, text, complaints, social media, and other interactions. Discover how to quickly identify and flag the most important problems and opportunities, and then better prioritize your investments.