In today's competitive market, companies need to offer the best possible experience to their customers to remain competitive. The voice of the customer (VoC) is a strategy that helps companies understand the needs and expectations of their customers, so they can improve their experience and, consequently, the business results.
Customer experience is more than just delivering on promised services or cultivating positive interactions, although both are important. Customer experience should be involved at every level of the business, including brand perception, marketing interactions, feedback management , and even product development.
With so many variables in this journey, it's crucial to focus efforts on creating an effective voice of the customer program, ensuring the experience aligns with customer feedback. When companies focus on their customers' needs and preferences, they consistently deliver targeted (and successful) experiences.
So, let's understand everything about the voice of the customer?
What is Voice of the Customer (VoC)?
Voice of the Customer, or VoC, is the process of collecting, analyzing, and using information about customer needs, expectations, and preferences. This information can be gathered through surveys, interviews, online assessments, customer behavioral data, and employee feedback.
The term 'voice of the customer' was first used by Abbie Griffin and John R. Hauser in a 1993 MIT Marketing Science paper titled “The Voice of Customer,” which described VOC in this way:
Voice of the Customer (VOC) is a term used in business to describe the process of capturing customer needs. VOC is a product development technique that produces a detailed set of customer wants and needs, which is organized into a hierarchical structure and then prioritized in terms of relative importance and satisfaction with current alternatives. The VOC process has important results and benefits for product developers.
When companies understand their customers, they can develop better processes and make better decisions across the entire organization – from marketing and sales to product development and customer success.
Check out our MasterClass: Everything you need to know about Voice of the Customer (VoC).
How does the voice of the customer benefit businesses, and why is it important?
Understanding the voice of the customer is not only good for the customer experience, but for the business as a whole. The richer and more personalized information you have about your customer, the better your decision-making will be, and you will have fewer surprises due to cancellations or misalignment between the customer and the company.
According to a report by the Aberdeen Group, the best-performing Voice of the Customer programs had 55% higher customer retention rates, a 23% in customer service costs, and nearly 10x higher year-over-year revenue growth compared to others.
This happens because by understanding the customer's needs, you are able to:
- Understanding your customers' preferences/expectations;
- To make more assertive, informed business decisions that align with customer needs;
- Discovering market timings to get the moment right for launching new products or services;
- To improve brand management and reputation ;
- Increase customer retention and relationship building ;
- Minimize negative experiences.
As mentioned earlier, the VoC strategy also helps in the development and innovation of products and services. When you know what your customer wants and expects, it becomes easier to adapt your products and services and ensure your customer's success.
In summary, the voice of the customer is important because:
- It helps companies better understand what their customers want and need;
- It allows companies to make more informed business decisions;
- It contributes to improving the customer experience;
- It increases customer satisfaction and retention;
- It reduces operating costs.
How to start a voice customer program correctly
A voice of the customer program helps you better understand customer choices, concerns, and preferences. However, simply collecting customer feedback isn't enough – what makes the difference is how the data is analyzed and, more importantly, how your company uses the insights generated to develop new strategies that will help achieve business objectives.
With that in mind, check out the steps to start a voice of the customer program:
1) Define clear objectives
Before starting the Voice of the Customer program, make sure you have clear and planned objectives that align with your company's context. List what you want to achieve by the end of the program. Example:
- Understanding why customers are not using a particular feature / are not accessing a particular page;
- Understanding the customer's perception of our service;
- Understanding why customers are not reaching a specific stage in their journey;
2) Collect the feedback
There are many ways to collect customer feedback. Here are some of the most common VoC techniques:
Search
Surveys are one of the most effective methods of collecting data from a large group of people. You can use a ready-made questionnaire template to save time and effort, or if you prefer, you can create your own questionnaire.
To achieve better results, our tips are:
- Keep the survey (and the questions) short and to the point;
- Ask clear questions with direct answers ("yes" / "no" and multiple choice work well);
- Segment your research based on personas for targeted results;
- Use key metrics for measuring customer experience, such as NPS, CES , or CSAT.
Online customer reviews
Online reviews are the comments that your customers or potential customers post on social media, booking sites, Google My Business, and which are mostly public and describe their experience with the brand, product, or service provided.
This feedback, in addition to helping companies improve the experience delivered, has a significant impact on the purchasing decisions of other potential customers.
Interviews or meetings
Interviews typically require more effort than other methods, but they are valuable opportunities to build relationships with your clients and, at the same time, gain a deeper understanding of their needs.
This method is ideal for discovering information about strategic clients. For example, let's say your goal in the first step is to understand the main needs of enterprise regarding your product. However, you haven't been able to gather enough data through research or other methods, so the best way to do this is through an interview or meeting.
Pro tip: As you gather data from surveys and interviews, consider what your customer truly needs and how that information translates into improvements for your product or service. Document these insights for alignment within your organization and ask the area that has direct contact with these customers, for example, the customer service/CS team – they are very likely to have relevant considerations to share.
Social networks and chats
Social media and customer service chats allow companies to communicate directly with their customers, usually in real time. These platforms enable you to collect and manage this feedback and also observe customer reactions.
Customer behavioral data
You can learn a lot simply by collecting and observing customer behavior, and one of the main ways to do this is to observe how customers interact with your service, average session time, buttons/actions they usually perform, which days they access it more or less, etc.
For example, understanding which attractions your customers visit/like most, what their preferred peak times are, where they plan a route to your establishment from, and what their preferred shopping categories are, heatmaps will help you see how your customers navigate your website/platform. All this information will bring even more intelligence and predictability to your operation.
Comparing what your customers say they want with how they behave will help you identify what you truly need for successful product development and strategy.
Employee feedback
Your employees often have valuable insights into the customer experience, especially those who interact directly with customers. For example, your customer service might notice certain customer patterns that aren't clear from other VoC research, such as common behaviors.
In addition, employees can help you identify obstacles in your processes or technologies that may hinder the successful delivery of the customer experience.
Our suggestion is to gather employee feedback (through surveys, brainstorming sessions, or whatever method you find best) to gain an insider's perspective on the customer experience.
3) Analyze and act on the feedback
After collecting customer feedback, companies need to analyze it to identify key trends and insights. This analysis should be done systematically and in a structured way so that companies can make the most of the information collected.
Feedback analysis should include the following steps:
- Feedback classification: feedback should be classified by type, source, and relevance.
- Quantitative analysis: feedback should be analyzed numerically to identify trends and patterns.
- Qualitative analysis: feedback should be analyzed textually to identify insights and perceptions.
Based on the results of the analysis, companies should implement improvements in their products, services, and processes; in other words, act on this feedback. These improvements should be directed towards the areas that presented the greatest problems or opportunities for improvement.
Implementing improvements based on customer feedback is essential to enhancing customer experience and business results. By acting on the feedback collected, companies demonstrate their commitment to meeting the needs and expectations of their customers.
Check out our webinar on Google My Business: how to optimize your strategy to attract more customers
Data that proves the importance of investing in a voice of the customer strategy:
- 46% of consumers feel satisfied when the organization responds to negative customer feedback – Oracle.
- 89% of consumers started doing business with a competitor after a bad experience – Oracle.
- Brazilian companies lose R$ 400 billion due to poor customer service – EXAME
- Implementing a voice of the customer (VOC) strategy generates, on average: (Search)
- a 10-fold increase in the company's annual revenue;
- 55% increase in customer retention rate;
- 23% reduction in customer service costs year-over-year;
- Employee engagement rates are 292% higher.
Conclusion
The voice of the customer is an essential strategy for companies that want to offer the best possible experience to their customers and, consequently, increase their results.
Companies that understand and value their customers are prepared to offer the best experiences that will keep them ahead of the competition, making it easier to increase retention rates and annual revenue year after year.
Are you already using this strategy in your company today? Discover Harmo, the first and only platform that integrates online reviews and satisfaction surveys to create an efficient voice of the customer program!