The power of customer surveys

Customer loyalty is a fragile thing, hard to earn and easy to lose. But it can be the major competitive strength of the business in situations where it is difficult to protect your products or services from being copied by competitors.

Customers who are engaged with you on how your products and services develop over time and who feel that their input is valued, are more likely to stay with you. Asking your customers what they think can be a powerful tool in your competitive strategy.

We need to acknowledge that we don’t know everything about our customers’ needs and be open to customer input. While we might be the expert at the functional nature of the product or service, the customer might have different uses or want to solve slightly different problems.

They might also wish for the product or service to be delivered differently, available in different forms, come with a variety of accessories or have other forms of help or after sales training options. We shouldn’t be second-guessing our customers. They can be our most valuable form of marketing information.

One of the things we try to do in business is buy time before our competitors can effectively compete with us. If our customers are committed to us, we buy time to improve our products and services to match those of our competitors. When our customers request changes to our product or service and we willingly engage with them in those discussions, they will give us time to put their suggestions in place.

During this time we are, in effect, blocking our competitors from taking away that business. Providing we deliver on our commitments, we show our customers we value their input but that we also want to provide products and services which satisfy their needs.

An exercise which I undertook when I had a software business was to have the customers suggest improvements and then circulate the entire list for them to rank. We could not commit to doing everything on the list but we always put effort into meeting the most popular items. Customers really appreciated the chance to see what others were asking for and valued the chance to participate in the decision as to what would be offered in a future version.

Whether it is a point of sale, internet or mail survey, a lot of valuable information can be gathered from customers and prospects about your products and services and the manner in which you interact with the customer. Feedback on how well you are doing allows you to assess your offerings, check the quality of your customer service and make sure you are not missing something important which would have your customers going over to your competitors without ever telling you they were dissatisfied.

Not all customers will respond, but should be sufficient for you to gauge the overall response. Customers don’t want their business taken for granted and most will welcome being asked their opinion. You should use this as an opportunity to improve your business and build loyalty with your customers.

Tom McKaskill is a successful global serial entrepreneur, educator and author who is a world acknowledged authority on exit strategies and the former Richard Pratt Professor of Entrepreneurship, Australian Graduate School of Entrepreneurship, Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, Australia.