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HomeTrend
Forecast
April 29 2009 Issue
Customer Satisfaction Surveys
HomeTrend Forecast is late this week! I try to get it out on Monday but sometimes life happens... I'm sure you know how it is.
The life that happened this week was that on Monday I got an urgent call from a colleague of mine who runs a boutique public relations company. She is making a pitch later this week, going up against bigger agencies, and desperately needs something that would really make her company stand out. Naturally, the "something" that I recommended was consumer insight - show her potential client that she understands the consumer who buys their products.
I quickly put together a questionnaire and fielded an online survey with my proprietary HomeTrend Influentials Panel on Monday evening. Within 24 hours, 75% of the panelists had taken the survey. By this morning, I had analyzed the data and provided her with a summary of key findings, conclusions, and implications.
If you are wishing you could get consumer input but don't think you have the time, don't resign yourself to moving forward without feedback from the consumer. The beauty of the online survey methodology and my HomeTrend Influentials Panel is that I can turn around a research project in a very short amount of time. While I prefer not to turn around an online survey project in less than 72 hours like I did this week, I can if need be.
Enough about what derailed my week and kept me from getting this week's HomeTrend Forecast out on Monday. Let's move on to my topic for this week: customer satisfaction surveys.
Customer satisfaction surveys are a common practice for many service organizations. You may even do them from time to time to make sure your own customer service reps are doing their job. However, customer satisfaction surveys are rarely, if ever, done among the people who have purchased products. (If you routinely conduct customer satisfaction surveys among the people who buy your company's products, I'd love to hear from you.) This year, I've conducted a couple of online customer satisfaction surveys and have come to realize how much actionable insight can be gained by polling current customers...insight that can be applied to product improvements, new product development, and sales, advertising and PR.
The first customer satisfaction survey I did this year was for a line of cookware. The product had distinct technological advantages over the competition but it wasn't selling well at retail. I conducted an online survey with a dozen HomeTrend Influentials who had gotten the cookware this year. I asked them why they bought that particular brand, what their initial reaction was when they first took the product out of the package and the first time they used the product. I asked them what they liked best and least about the product. I asked them how likely they would be to go out and buy more pieces of that cookware and if they would buy it to give as a gift. Because of the insight I gained from polling the people who had purchased the cookware, I was able to diagnose why the product wasn't selling well at retail and what the manufacturer could do about it.
I am now convinced that conducting customer satisfaction surveys with current owners is something that housewares manufacturers should do routinely.
That's why I conduct customer satisfaction surveys with HomeTrend Influentials Panel members a month or two after they have redeemed their accrued HIP Dollars for housewares products from the HIP Rewards Catalog. (HIPsters don't get paid in cash whenever they participate in a research project; rather, they earn HIP Dollars which they redeem for items in the HIP Rewards Catalog.) It gives the housewares manufacturers who participate in the HIP Rewards Program yet another good reason to join the program.
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