Providing an excellent product or service and putting hours into perfecting your marketing materials and service delivery are all extremely important. However the most critical factor is whether or not your customers (or clients) are satisfied with your service, and in turn, whether they become repeat customers and refer your business to others.
The best way to determine if your product or service is living up to your customers’ expectations is to conduct some form of market research, specifically, customer satisfaction research. We’ve outlined below why this type of research should be an essential part of your everyday business operations and how it can be done quickly and cost effectively.
Why conduct market research?
There is no use investing time, energy and money into marketing your business if you haven’t factored in your customers’ needs and wants. Emotional attachment to your business can make it tricky for you to get to the heart of what your customers are really looking for. However, think of it as an opportunity to improve your relationships with your customers and identify potential business offerings. Your employees will have an added incentive to perform if they know they will be ‘assessed’ by your customers as well.
Getting started
An easy place to start is by obtaining feedback from your existing customers. Consider methods such as: including a voluntary feedback form with your final invoice with an incentive for completion; training staff to ask particular, non-intrusive questions when speaking with customers (eg. Were you satisfied with the service XYZ Company provided? Why / why not?); or engaging an external company to conduct brief customer satisfaction interviews over the phone or in person.
Your research needn’t involve every customer: if yours is a business with a large volume of customers, you can either randomly or methodically segment your customers to ensure an accurate representation of your entire customer base (eg. selecting every fifth customer; choosing a certain amount of customers from each industry, demographic, or amount of money spent with your business).
Making it work
There are three things that will determine whether customer satisfaction research is successful for your business: 1) Whether the questions you ask are relevant and seek to uncover the good and bad aspects of your business, 2) Whether every employee involved in the program is engaged with the process and motivated for it to succeed, and 3) Whether you actually act upon the information you receive in order to improve your product or service and demonstrate to your customers that you have done so.
When introduced into the day-to-day operations of your business, customer satisfaction research can provide you with invaluable insight into your customer base and arm you with the tools you need to ensure your business’s continued success.
Conducting customer satisfaction research needn’t be hugely expensive or time consuming. Start by taking the time to think about: a) What it is you want to find out, b) How you will go about it and c) What you plan on doing with the information. Consider holding a brainstorming workshop with senior employees from different areas of the business to obtain fresh ideas as well as their commitment to the process.
If you would like further information or help with establishing your customer satisfaction research program, please contact me on 07 3899 8335 or email megan@marketsavvvy.com.au .
Best wishes – Megan.