In a highly competitive economic market, where digitalization has led to the creation of an ever-increasing number of activities, being able to differentiate oneself for a company becomes the primary element in achieving success.
To analyze your customer satisfaction you always start by writing a customer satisfaction questionnaire, and this post explains the key elements to do it correctly.
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Beyond the general concept of quality
From this perspective, it is not enough to simply present an offer of "quality" products, but also to intervene in order to strengthen and improve the set of services that are connected to a product, in order to obtain full user satisfaction.
Furthermore, repurchasing by acquired customers is essential for a correct marketing approach, because working only on the acquisition of new customers and not on the valorization of existing ones is not sustainable in most cases.
The creation of a structured customer questionnaire in the company allows to identify a series of actions that must be carried out in order to improve the activities of a company.
The attention that every company must pay to customer satisfaction must be considered not as an optional reality but as a necessity . In fact, a satisfied or dissatisfied customer has a significant impact on the fate of the company.
In this post we will consider the importance of customer satisfaction and how to structure a satisfaction questionnaire in order to reveal company performance .
What is a satisfaction questionnaire: the concept of quality of a service
A customer satisfaction questionnaire is a tool used to identify the strategies needed to create new customers and, above all, retain them.
For a company, it is not enough that a new user decides to purchase its product/service, but it will be essential for its development that he also carries out new operations in the future, adhering to the various marketing campaigns.
A questionnaire is therefore a set of questions that are asked to the user in order to identify his level of satisfaction and thus reveal his needs and requests , thus allowing the company to adapt its services by increasing productivity.
The concept of satisfaction: what it means and what are its characteristics
What does customer satisfaction mean? Understanding this concept is essential in order to be able to develop a careful questionnaire that allows us to understand what the customer wants.
When referring to the achievement of the satisfaction objective, a series of elements are considered that are not only strictly connected to quality.
Customer satisfaction is not only based on objective aspects, but also and above all on subjective aspects.
In fact, it is not enough for a product to have objective characteristics such as a high quality standard, but also subjective aspects that are able to reflect the customer's expectations and his perception in obtaining the product.
In fact, when the user purchases an item, he will also do so because there will be a specific expectation in reaching his personal goal.
Why Create a Customer Satisfaction Survey?
At this point, one might wonder what the need is to know what the customer wants, especially when the quality standards of a company product are very high.
Attention to a single user and the target audience they are referring to can greatly influence a company's production activities.
In fact, a dissatisfied customer tends not to purchase other products , to create a series of difficulties for the company with complaints, returns and replacement of items and also creates negative word of mouth , an enormous and silent danger for a company.
Instead, if you manage to obtain customer satisfaction, you will lead them to be loyal to the company by making new investments in brand products, becoming the first real advertising promoter of the same and allowing the company's profitability to increase.
Finally, in the case of price variations, the customer who is happy with the quality of a service will be significantly less sensitive to price increases, accepting the changes.
How to build a satisfaction questionnaire
In order to structure a customer questionnaire that allows you to develop the right strategies to improve customer loyalty and satisfaction, some basic aspects must be considered.
For this reason, in order to create a valid questionnaire, the contents of the questionnaire must be considered and then its creation will be carried out.
Below we list the main steps to be carried out for its creation:
• Choose the type of customer : who to contact? This is the first question that is the basis of a valid questionnaire. In fact, in wanting to understand the level of satisfaction of a user, you can contact different figures that are internal or external to the company. In the first case, reference is made to employees or collaborators, in the second, to any final consumers, such as private individuals, or to retailers who therefore use the product and then resell it. Furthermore, the customer can also be a company that receives an item as part of a production chain, or an installer who therefore provides a service whose basic element is the quality of a product. Finally, you must consider whether you want to contact a current customer or someone who, for example, no longer buys regularly (to understand, for example, the reason for abandoning them). • Arouse the user's interest : the questions must be structured in such a way as to arouse the customer's interest and push him to complete them all. For this reason, it will be important to know his needs and the interests of the target audience. • Make the questionnaire simple and direct : choosing the number of questions and the duration of the questionnaire are two other aspects to consider in order to obtain a greater number of responses from users, avoiding that they lose interest in filling it out due to excessive length or overly complex questions.
The most common mistakes
The customer satisfaction questionnaire is too often underestimated in the corporate sector, both by not providing the right synergy of forces necessary to create one that produces results, and by not paying due attention to its implications on the company's productivity.
But what are the most common mistakes that should not be made in a satisfaction questionnaire? Below we highlight the most common ones:
• No objective : not setting a specific purpose for which the questionnaire is created often leads to the creation of one that is ineffective and only determines a waste of resources both in terms of personnel and from an economic point of view. • Failure to evaluate the target : not defining the customers to whom the questionnaire must be addressed leads to questions that are too generic and with answers that are not useful. • Lack of attention to the reference sector : each company has its own characteristics, a specific target of customers, a product and services that have been customized. Therefore, it is not enough to take other types of questionnaires carried out in competing companies as an example, but it will be essential to create a specific one that pays attention to the reference sector and its customers.
Choosing a questionnaire: which model to create in the company?
A questionnaire also varies based on the delivery method you want to implement and therefore the system you use to relate to a customer.
• Direct interviews : it will be possible for an interviewer to ask questions directly to a user. This system provides enormous advantages in terms of obtaining answers, their completeness and also the effectiveness of the questionnaire. The big problem is the costs and application times.
• Telephone contact : it is a valid alternative to reach a larger number of users and at the same time save on costs and personnel. This system requires a fairly short implementation time, furthermore thanks to the quality of the interviewers it will be possible to have complete answers to the questionnaire. Often however some subjects are not easily contactable and furthermore given the excessive diffusion of tele-marketing systems by telephone there is also a very high percentage of refusals.
• Online questionnaire : thanks to digitalization and the application of artificial intelligence systems, it is possible to create suitable questionnaires with the help of specific software. The advantages are fast production and low production costs.
The creation phase: techniques for building a satisfaction questionnaire
A questionnaire includes a series of questions that must generate an answer. But how should they be formulated? Two different types of approach can be applied: direct or indirect . In the first case, as can be understood from the term, the customer is asked directly about the level of satisfaction.
Instead, with an indirect approach , more than one question is generated which has the aim of obtaining the level of user satisfaction in relation to the individual activities of the company .
An example of a direct approach could be the question: were you satisfied with the delivery times? The answer could be positive or negative.
In the indirect approach, a combination of two questions is always generated. If the customer's answer is similar, it means that the subject is satisfied. Vice versa, the opposite situation will occur.
Of course, a direct approach questionnaire is shorter and will require less time than the other version.
The right outline: how to structure an ideal sequence
Another choice is how to ask the questions in sequence, that is, what order allows the type of satisfaction to be expressed from the customer's point of view.
In fact, a questionnaire will ask for both a general vision of the company's quality level and expectations specifically linked to a product.
One technique is to start with generic questions about services , developing the questionnaire until reaching more specific themes that focus on a particular item.
Another solution in case you want to have an immediate direct impression on a service is to start with specific questions and then move on to the general reality of the company.
The rating scale to be used
Depending on the type of question asked, a user will be able to respond with a rating expressed on a rating scale . This is almost always numerical, so as to allow for easier data processing.
Even in this case the choice must be careful in order to achieve the intended objective. In fact, it will be possible to use a scale of even values, in order to avoid indecision by the customer, or one with a numbering that also includes odd ones which often identify indecision.
The content of the questions
Questions should be formulated in order to obtain a simple understanding of the topics and arouse interest on the part of customers .
The combination of these two elements is fundamental because if you use a grammar that is too complex or with a subject that does not capture the user's attention, the questionnaire will not be filled out and will consequently be useless.
For this reason, it is very important to introduce topics that can arouse curiosity in the customer and that arise from a deep knowledge of their needs.
Of course, the aim will be to achieve the company objective and therefore we must not forget to include useful questions to allow the analysis of customer satisfaction.
Give space to customer opinions and their motivations
To have a complete vision of the customer's thoughts, it is not enough for them to express a judgment based on the scale that has been indicated to them, but that they also express a specific opinion .
It can be very advantageous to introduce open-ended questions through which the user can express a spontaneous thought and a specific motivation in giving an answer or making a choice.
These types of questions can be very advantageous in order to outline the differences with competitors while leaving the customer free to express his opinion.
However, if on the one hand we foresee ample possibilities for subsequent analysis, on the other hand we must be very careful not to make the questionnaire too long and therefore difficult to fill out.
When to propose a questionnaire
Finally, the last question to consider is when to propose a questionnaire in order to reveal customer satisfaction.
In fact, many investigations must be carried out on an occasional basis, but others require continuous follow-up.
It will be important at this point to carefully evaluate a periodic insertion in the company's activities, without exaggerating with interviews. The risk is that of being able to push the customer to no longer consider a questionnaire in the future.
An extra help
If you still have doubts about how to create your questionnaire, comment below and we will gladly give you a hand!
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