Three "must haves" to find the Voice of the Customer

Getting key feedback from customers is nothing new. And in the height of the information age, it has become easier than ever to get the voice of your customer. However, not every Voice of the Customer (VoC) program is successful.

What is Voice of the Customer?

Voice of the Customer is a research program that captures the experience customers have during their entire customer journey with you. The feedback covers areas like product performance, company direction, and employee interaction and support. VoC intends to return direct information from buyers back to your company to bridge the gaps between company perception of performance and actual results.

To create a successful VoC program, you need to consider three important factors: what information you gather, how you get it, and how you use it.

What Information to Gather

If you aren't asking the right questions, you can't expect to get the right answers. Consider the key points that matter:

• Do your customers believe you understand their needs?
• Are you demonstrating the ability to solve that need?
• What roadblocks appear on a consistent basis throughout your customer base?
• Are you able to solve those roadblocks quickly?
• Do your customers consider you a valuable partner?
• Would they recommend you to their peers?
• What is the likelihood of doing future business with you?

How to Gather Voice of the Customer Data

A best practice is gathering both qualitative and quantitative answers in two stages: use a web survey to gather quantitative data and a phone interview for qualitative. Using the web for quantitative and phones for qualitative lets the customer respond in the easiest way for each type of question. People are far less likely to type out long-form explanations to rating scales than to share them in a conversation.

You've Got the Information — Now What?

One of the biggest travesties in competitive intelligence is keeping it locked away from the general company population. Get it out to the right people — not just leadership. Encourage department heads to disseminate the data throughout their teams so that all are on the same page about what is working and what isn't. Organize action committees to make sure that needed changes get implemented. The more your people get good intelligence and see the company using it to improve, the more they will be interested in participating in future research.