With the big bang of social media tools, there are now countless ways your customers can tell you what they feel about your organization, brand, product or services and their experiences.Customer feedback isn’t a new concept. It’s been around since commerce began the only difference is the tools usedand it’s now more democratized. It is easier now for the everyday customer to applaud or criticize your brand.
But the question is: What are you doing with
that customer feedback? And, more
importantly, are you using those customer thoughts, ideas and opinions to
strengthen their experience with your organization?
According to
research, in this modern and competitive age,the average business loses about 10%
of their customer base every year, and some don't know why. Increased
competition, pressure for time, decisions, and action are burdening owners like
never before.To gain a competitive advantage over your competition, and to grow
a healthy and successful business, intelligent owners and their managers are using
customer feedback to their advantage.
I want to focus on five actionable tips that
can help you start utilizing that customer feedback to drive performance for
your organization;
1.
Don’t procrastinate:Make sure you’re busy doing something
productive and meaningful with your customer feedback. Some organizations have
no set or loose discipline, principles and structure to leverage what customers
tell them through actions or words, online or offline. Enroll and empower the
people within your organization who make decisions (both the direction-changing
and the daily kind) to set yourself up for performance payoffs down the road.
You must operationalize the change. Act Now.
2.
Minimize customer
effort: Through listening
or observation, find out how many times prospects and customers have to
interact with you to get what they need. Understand their point of view
regarding how hard they’re working to get what they need. This direct feedback
can lead you directly to customer “paint points” you could probably easily
solve to create added value for a much larger group of customers.
3.
Turn feedback
into ideas: Use
customer observations, ideas, answers and feedback to drive product and service
innovation for your company. Most times, customers have ideas you haven’t evenconsidered
since they’re the ones actually using your products and services on a daily
basis. Create simple processes where you can get that direct customer feedback
into the hands of product designers and innovation leads for your company.
4.
Identifyemerging
customer needs: Use
customer feedback to identify needs that haven’t been solved or even articulated
yet. Don’t just take customer comments and feedback at face value,dive in. Social
networking tools like Twitter or Facebook may be particularly helpful here.
Emerging needs are the headwaters of demand for your organization. Give
yourself the opportunity to solve a greater number of customer needs in the
future.
5.
Get involved emotionally: Identify the emotional tone your
customers convey when they talk about your product, brand or organization. Does
it match what you hoped customers would feel in your defined target, or ideal
customer experience? If not, how can you relate with that? Are the
emotions you hear consistent across customers? Are they consistent for each
customer over time? While the tangible elements of your customer experience
most directly solve a customer’s need, the emotional elements build loyalty.
You must consider the emotional elements of your customer experience. More
often than not, it’s the emotional connection to your brand that is much
stronger than rational one. Work to strengthen that by listening intently to customer
feedback. As the wise Maya Angelou once said, “I’ve learned that people will
forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never
forget how you made them feel.”For
instance,a customer may complain about pricing and after several missed
sales, you may adjust prices. A customer may say you don't have a large enough
selection and you may consider ordering more inventory. A customer may
compliment you about the cleanliness of your store or helpfulness of your
salespeople so that you know you are doing something right.
If you can make it easy for your customers to provide feedback, then you should use their feedback to find out what's most important to them (likes and dislikes), focus your efforts on meeting and/or surpassing those needs. Trust me; you'll get the benefits of their future patronage and that of many new customers.
If you are thinking
of advertising in Nigeria, please contact PoiseMedia Communications at www.poisemedianigeria.com or check our contact at the bottom of this blog. We can help you
identify your market and reach them. We apply both BTL and ATL strategies to
project our clients’ brands to the right audience. We can do same for you at
very affordable price.
LilianIzuorah
Business Development Officer
PoiseMedia Communications Ltd
