They say that the customer is always right. Although if you are in sales or the service industry, this can be a tough thing to deal with, especially if they are difficult, picky, or just plain rude. However, it is true that while they might not always be factually correct, they are always right in the sense that they need to be high up the priority list for anyone that is trying to sell. After all, it’s their purchases that pay your wages, so why wouldn’t you try and increase the positivity of their experience? However before you can do this, you will need to seek out those customer’s opinions so you can find out what they really want. With this in mind read on for a guide on sourcing reliable customer feedback that can help you build a better business.
Surveys
In the modern era, we have unprecedented access to customer feedback. One of the ways business owner can access this is through surveys.
Surveys are usually short questionnaires that include mostly closed questions of the yes/no or degrees of agreement variety. They are designed in this way to make them easier to complete, something that can increase the return rate.
Many companies now use online survey providers that pay rewards in the form of points, vouchers, or even cash to their participants now. This motivates them to actually fill out the surveys, proving more information for the company that is seeking it. This can work exceptionally well because the surveys are quick and easy to do, the participants are motivated, and they can easily access them online making it easy to actually collect the results. After all, who but the most prepared people will return postal surveys?
The Information that is gathered that can be then used to change the product or service you are offering to make it more appealing and so more sellable. Something that can definitely help you to build a better business.
Business adjacent sites
Don’t forget that customer opinions exist in places outside of the more traditional things like surveys too. Unfortunately, many businesses often ignore the importance of comments and articles on sites that are adjacent to their company. These sites are dedicated to users and fans of the company’s brand or product, like this https://netflixupdate.com/star-wars-rebels-netflix/ site for Netflix, and can be very informative to what customers are specifically asking for.
As a business owner, try not to see these sites as troublesome or as an irritation. Instead keep an eye on them, taking in what is trending and what customers are asking for, as this information can all be used to help to further inform your product or service. Something that can enable you to provide more of what people want right now and so help to boost your businesses success.
Reviews
Reviews are another fantastic way of collecting customer feedback that can help you shape your products, customer service, and even your marketing strategy.
Learn from the good as well as the bad!
Reviews are all about previous customers leaving you feedback on how they found their purchase and their purchase experience online. They can do this through your own review system or through independent services such as the one offered at https://uk.trustpilot.com/categories.
Using reviews is particularly useful because you are dealing with people that have actually been through your sales system so they will have highly relevant feedback and suggestions that can be used for improvement, a lot of the time.
Of course, extracting the data from these reviews isn’t as easy as it is from surveys. This is because of two factors. The first is that not all reviews are genuine, as some unscrupulous sites offer payment for requested reviews, both positive and negative. Something that can distort the results.
The second issue is that the most valuable feedback often comes from negative reviews, not something that you will be actually aiming to get for your business. In fact, such reviews may even put other potential customers off. That is why it’s so vital to deal with these evaluations in a highly compassionate and non-confrontational manner. Something you can learn about in detail at https://econsultancy.com/blog/.
It’s never too late to say you are sorry!
In summary, though, the best approach is, to be honest, apologize, say you value their feedback, which can be used to make sure this never happens again and offer recompense. In this way, you can use a lousy review for two useful purposes. One to show that you care about your customers, and the second to show that you are open to changing the way things are run to better accommodate them in line with their feedback. Something that will allow you to build a better and more successful business.
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