Imagine you had the chance to speak to your hero? Just you and them, with all the time in the world. Chances are you’d want to ask them a question or two ... or seven. The opportunity would be too good to miss – after all, when would you ever get another chance to ask them every single thing you’ve ever wanted to know?
Often it seems that customer service surveys seem to follow the same thinking.
You finally have a chance to speak to your customer, so you want to ask them EVERYTHING.
The honest truth, though, is getting all the time in the world with someone isn’t going to happen. People are busy. While there will always be a few who are happy to give you their time, most people just don’t have the option. Their to-do list is already too long and, frankly, answering your lengthy questionnaire isn’t a priority.
So where does this leave you?
Instead of trying to ask customers as many questions as possible, keep it simple. For example, if you’re asking a Net Promoter Score question, ask the customer how likely they would be to recommend you (typically on a scale of 1 – 10) and then ask them “why?”. Nothing more, nothing less.
Giving your customers the opportunity to explain the score, in their own words and in the moment, allows you to uncover insight into the way that they think and feel.
Still not convinced? Before you dismiss this idea as crazy or out-of-hand, consider these three reasons why asking less questions could be just the solution that you’re looking for.
#1 Less questions = more responses...
It’s well known that survey responses aren’t exactly high. Typically, they will get between 2-5% response rate – not exactly a true representation of your whole client base.
Using a real-time approach, our clients achieve response rates ranging from 35% to 90%. As well, "Feedback collected at the point of service delivery is 40% more accurate than that collected 24 hours later" (Gartner).
As an added bonus, the responses you get will have richer feedback than any survey could give you. Your customers are never ‘somewhat satisfied’ and no survey (not matter how long) can anticipate everything they think. By simply asking them ‘how are we doing?’ and letting your customers respond in their own words, you’ll capture much richer insight. It’s about capturing what’s important to the customer – in the moment – rather than trying to shoehorn their response into what you want to measure.
#2 One question for customer feedback makes it easier for your customers
Have you ever been in an exam and not known the answer to a question? It’s horrible. That’s the feeling your customer will have when you ask them about part of your organisation that they’ve not experienced - especially if you make an answer compulsory.
Or perhaps they just feel indifferent about a specific part of the journey. The website was nice, but not significant to them. They’d much rather share their opinion about the friendly engineers who came to service their boiler or the excellent post-order communications. So making them answer questions about your website is just a burden for them.
By asking one question, you eliminate the ‘I don’t know the answer’ dread. Plus, you free your customers to focus on what matter to them.
#3 Importance of not asking leading questions
Asking multiple survey questions means it's more likely that you’ll ask leading questions, which will skew the data and mean any conclusions you draw are based on unsound information.
Asking a neutral, single questions, means that the customer isn’t going to be lead in a particular direction. If they want to tell you about the website, they will. Or, if they’d rather share their view on your delivery process, they can do that instead.
You’re not going to be able to ask about every single thing. What if the particular area a customer wants to lead feedback on isn’t included in the survey? They’ll be disappointed that they can’t share their view and you’ll have missed out on valuable insight.
