Improve Customer Satisfaction: Why Surveys Are Pathways To Identifying Customer Needs

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Happy customers are the driving force of a successful business. As every product or service is tailored to fulfill customer needs, getting an accurate picture of their journey is essential to improve customer satisfaction. In fact, 33% of Americans say they’ll consider switching companies after just a single instance of poor service. While most businesses believe they are customer-centric, the reality is they are more focused on their products/services instead of thinking about their customers first.

Measuring customer satisfaction is imperative for businesses that want to tap into the customers’ psyche and boost their overall experience. So, how do you build a growth-inducing customer satisfaction (CSAT) survey that collects true and unbiased feedback from the customers? Let’s find out:

Best practices for creating customer satisfaction surveys:

How to make sure you capture relevant data on customer needs to take efficient action when conducting customer satisfaction surveys? Here are some best practices for creating engaging surveys to get the results you want. 

01. Begin by choosing the right survey type

To collect accurate feedback from your customers, it’s essential to choose a survey type that matches your goals. Consider the type of information you need to gather. Is it qualitative or quantitative? 

For example, if you want results highlighting the trends at a glance, you should opt for either NPS® or CSAT survey. Likewise, if you need detailed and descriptive insights into customer experience, you should consider a CES survey. Here’s a sneak peek into different surveys for measuring customer satisfaction:

Customer Satisfaction Surveys The road to identifying customers needs 05

02. Approach the customer at the right time

When it comes to sending surveys, timing matters a lot. Deploying surveys at the wrong time might fetch you inaccurate results. To ask your customers for feedback, it’s important to identify the ideal touchpoints after completing an interaction with your customer. This helps to improve customer satisfaction at every stage.

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03. Ask a limited number of questions

Figuring out the correct length might be tricky for those who’re sending a survey for the first time. There’s no doubt that asking a lot of questions may cause the customers to abandon the survey but not asking enough questions won’t let you gather the required information. Although there’s no defined standard for the survey length, an ideal survey should range between 10-20 minutes. 

04. Test your survey always

Before deploying a survey to improve customer satisfaction, it’s important to test it, too. You can send it to a small group initially to check the results that you obtain. Following up with this group and soliciting feedback from them will help you discover the gaps in your survey. Once you are sure about the effectiveness of your survey, you can start sharing it with your targeted customers.

05. Respond promptly after receiving feedback

Following up with survey respondents is the most important yet most ignored step in the customer satisfaction campaign. Once you receive some feedback from your customers, it’s important to respond back to them immediately. In case it’s a positive one, you must ensure to thank them with an email or a handwritten note. After getting negative responses, you should personally get in touch with them, asking for the reason behind it and how you could improve.

Related read: CX Personalization: The key to stellar customer experience

The role of customer satisfaction surveys in understanding customer needs

To meet & exceed customer expectations, you have to first identify and learn about their needs. So, in this section, we’ll delve into the role customer satisfaction surveys play in exposing customer needs. 

1. Uncovering hidden insights:  

Surveys are invaluable for unveiling the many layers of customers’ preferences. You can gather insights beyond the surface-level feedback by asking tailored and targeted questions. 

For example, a tech company discovers that its users value navigation guides over flashy features through customer surveys. These insights guide product development, leading to an increase in customer satisfaction and loyalty. 

2. Enhancing products/services:

Customer needs are evolving with the advancement in technology, and businesses must adapt to these dynamic needs to stay relevant. Surveys can provide a real-time pulse on customers’ perception of the product/service, allowing you to refine or introduce new offerings. 

3. Proactive issue resolution:

Surveys can help you anticipate customer concerns. Customer feedback enables you to identify potential issues, allowing you to resolve them swiftly before they escalate. 

For example, a restaurant employs a CSAT survey to gather any dissatisfaction, turning potential negative reviews into an opportunity for service recovery. 

4. Monitoring success:

Surveys provide quantifiable data that allows you to gauge the success of customer-centric initiatives. For example, a retail chain measuring customer satisfaction through regular surveys can consistently adjust its strategies to meet/exceed customer expectations. 

Related read: How to gain CX Insights that matter

Create surveys that bring honest responses with Voxco Online.

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Ace your customer satisfaction survey with the right question types

The questions of a customer satisfaction survey need to be precise, specific, and straightforward. The data you’ll get from your survey is directly proportional to the way you pose a question. Here are some question types that you should include in your customer satisfaction survey:

01. Questions related to product/service usage

To gauge customer success and satisfaction levels, collecting feedback about the product/service your customers are using is important. Without such feedback, assessing your customers’ needs and offering them an effective solution is impossible. 

Discovering how satisfied your customers are will help to identify key areas of improvement in your product/service. Your product marketing teams can use this information to enhance customer retention, too.

02. Questions related to demographics

Playing a key role in customer segmentation, demographics empower your sales and marketing divisions to create buyer personas seamlessly. Once the customers are grouped according to their characteristics (like age, location, gender, marital status, etc.), the process of visualizing the target audience gets simplified, and it helps to follow up with leads most likely to convert.  

03. Questions with open text

By enabling the respondents to express their opinions completely, these are free-form questions that come up with an open text format. As the answers are not limited to a prewritten or closed set of responses, the feedback received using these questions is true and unbiased. These questions can prove to be an instrumental asset for identifying the concerns that your customers have. 

Related read: ROI for CX transformation

Voxco helps the top 50 MR firms & 500+ global brands gather omnichannel feedback, measure sentiment, uncover insights, and act on them.

See how Voxco can enhance your research efficiency.

Conclusion

The true measure of success lies in cultivating a customer of continuous improvement. CSAT surveys play a transformational role in understanding the evolving customer needs, thus enabling you to make data-driven decisions to elevate satisfaction levels. 

Creating a customer satisfaction survey helps to determine the core value of your customers, identify their pain points, and innovate around their needs. Voxco offers best-in-class, omnichannel CX solutions that empower brands to improve customer satisfaction – thereby winning customers’ hearts & loyalty. For more info, get in touch with us today!

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