Written by Jess Rushton, Head of Business Development, Smart Money People
I’m sure Prince William knew that the pint he pulled recently in a pub in Wrexham to mark St David’s Day wasn’t the best, but he quickly appeared across the news outlets with a pint of lager that even he admitted might settle in about an hour.
This is an extreme version of receiving feedback of course, but nonetheless it clearly demonstrates that virtually every interaction asks or seems to warrant some kind of feedback. Sometimes this is welcome – like when you’re dealing with a financial company for the first time. But it can also become too intrusive. Not everyone wants to rate their experience of an online video call, using a particular car park or the future King’s pint pouring technique.
There’s also the question of how often to ask for customer feedback if you want to maximise the response rate. While there’s no definitive answer to this question, here are some pointers to consider:
Little and often
As a rule of thumb, the less information you want to gather, the more often you should ask for it.
So if you simply want a mark out of five, you should be fine to request it after any interaction. You might even find this preferable. Research shows that people will spend up to 75 seconds on single question surveys. But with multiple questions this figure drops to 20 seconds or less per question.
Less frequently for more depth of detail
If you’re looking for a more detailed form of feedback with several questions and a multiple-choice element, then asking once every few months is ideal. By seeking valuable feedback beyond a simple star rating, you’ll be able to get a more accurate picture of how your customers see your company.
To make this feedback even more useful, it’s a good idea to tailor the questions depending on the scenario. This way, you’ll get the most out of the answers and be able to make better company decisions going forward.
Go via a third party site
Many companies have achieved a good balance of gathering feedback using a tried and trusted format through third-party review sites. For example, our own review platform offers customers the opportunity to leave feedback at their own time and pace, while providing solutions for companies to invite reviews.
Using a dedicated review site also means that the feedback can be seen by potential customers as well as by the company in question. And good, visible feedback can be as effective a promotional tool as personal recommendation through word-of-mouth.
As a final consideration, companies can sidestep the issue of “how often?” completely by seeking so-called passive feedback. These are opinions expressed via the many social media channels available today. The only caveats are that you need a single place to store the data along with the analytical tools, probably driven by AI, to collate and make sense of it. Therefore, unless you have sufficient time and resource available to do this, working with a third party site, like Smart Money People will likely be preferable.
Summary
The question of “how often” really depends on the kind and depth of feedback that you want to receive. But the most important thing is to encourage responses from your customers, as this is how you’ll achieve continuous improvement for your company.
