Feedback in The Digital Age
One of the hallmarks of the digital age is the fact that digital media consumers have many more options than ever before. As digital companies gain more and more competition, customer loyalty becomes their bread and butter. When it comes down to it, the only way to create customer loyalty is to satisfy the customer in every way—and you can’t do that without trust and feedback.
Best Ways to Obtain and Manage User Feedback
There are many ways one can choose to collect opinions and comments from their customers. The most common tool is a customer survey, but consumers often ignore these. Instead of relying on surveys that most people won’t answer, you should consider investing in product experience software.
Product experience software can do many things—one of which is collecting and analyzing customer feedback to determine where to implement improvements. These programs usually include software for customer satisfaction surveys, but they automate the process so that you don’t have to waste a lot of payroll money on telemarketers.
There are many brands of product experience software, but you shouldn’t choose one at random. Random actions tend to produce random results, and that isn’t what you want. Instead, you might start by taking a look at PX software made by a company called Gainsight. They are one of the more trusted brands, so use them as a benchmark for comparison. Others you may want to consider are Pendo, Heap, and WalkMe.
Other popular methods of feedback collection include:
- Online chats
- Response forms on a web site
- Auditing your customer service department
- Courtesy calls
- An email list
- Social media interaction
- Pre-purchase survey form (voluntary)
Determine What the Feedback Means
Customer feedback can vary drastically. Some users might love your product, while others may hate it. You might hear about continuous app crashes to a desired feature or compliments on a job well-done to a typo within the body copy.
Technically, you don’t actually need specific software to collect user feedback—although it has its perks. However, you do need specific software to analyze all that data and figure out what it means. Although there is no substitute for old-fashioned manual review, most people and companies don’t have the time for that.
PX software programs can organize and analyze months’ worth of data in a matter of seconds, giving you a way to search within that data for any specific term or recurring pattern. Those recurring patterns are the real gold at the end of this rainbow. Pattern recognition is one of the best ways to recognize a threat to your company before it becomes a crisis.
Using the Data Gathered for Growth and Success
As we said earlier, there is no substitute for authentic customer satisfaction. Don’t look at customer complaints as an annoyance or an insult. Look at them as opportunities to grow and learn from your mistakes. Use PX software to figure out your most frequent complaints and address them.
When a customer makes a complaint, you should try to respond as often as possible. Let them know you heard their grievance and are working to correct the problem. If the complaint is not legitimate for one reason or another, you should explain how and why it is not legitimate without being rude to the customer.
In many cases, unsatisfied customers have made some attempt to make their complaints known. When they are ignored or brushed off, they tend to get angry and write long ranting reviews, which doesn’t look good. Thus, you should always make sure that those whom voice complaints get a timely and satisfactory response.
Criticism is Key
No matter what kind of company you run, the customer’s product experience is the ultimate barometer of your success. Without satisfied customers, you are unlikely to stay in business very long.
You should always remember that the customer is the one who uses the product, and thus, they are the best source of constructive criticism that you have. Only through criticism can a company improve, so keep your mind open to new ideas. You will likely find that your business is more successful as a result.