Listen to your audience to meet consumer expectations

Do you really understand your customers? I’m not talking about creating personas, doing keyword research and looking at their demographics (although that’s important too)!

I mean listening to what your audience really wants and needs to improve the customer experience.

First, let’s see what Voice of Customer (VoC) means.

This is a research process that captures what your audience is saying and how it relates to your brand. Companies do this by collecting feedback from consumers, either through a survey, discussion group, or online reviews.

Voice of Customer tools can help you:

Explore and evaluate new products and services.

Improve consumer engagement and retention

Discover negative comments about the brand

So how can you use Voice of Customer tools to improve your business? Here are 4 ways:

1. Surveys

You can send surveys to certain segments or after a person has purchased your product or service.

Here’s an example of a company that listened and responded to what people wanted: 1-800 Contacts, the world’s largest contact lens supplier. They used surveys to collect consumer expectations with a company called Qualtrics.

One respondent jokingly asked the company to send him a chocolate bar and guess what? They did it! This led them to implement a program where they give gifts to people.

As a result, they increased their order rate by 3.8 percent and increased their NPS by 13 points in just three months. Net Promoter Score (NPS) is a management tool used to measure the loyalty of your customers; Learn more here.

There are numerous survey tools, from Survey Monkey to VWO, so you can find the right format for your needs.

To get the best response rate, make sure you:

Be brief. People don’t want to answer 50 questions about their experience. Limit your survey to about five questions and tell respondents that it will only take a few minutes of their time.

give them something Offer a discount coupon, trade to win a price, or a gift to show your appreciation (if possible).

Remind them how important it is. Thank people for taking the time and letting them know that you are using their feedback to improve your processes.

Here are some great questions to ask that should elicit some helpful answers:

How can we improve your customer experience?

Would you recommend our service or product and why or why not?

What did you like/dislike about your experience?

Would you buy our product or service again?

2. Interviews

Usually done in person or over the phone, the interview process allows you to talk individually or with a group of people about your product or service. This method gained popularity after it was popularized in a book called The Lean Startup by Eric Ries.

Discovering consumer expectations in this way comes at a higher cost, but can provide surprising insight and impress your consumers with a more personal type of interaction.

I’m not sure? Here’s an example from Febreze. Originally, P&G tried to sell its scented sprays by claiming to fix odors in your home, with dismal results. The problem was that most people don’t know or believe that their houses smell, so why would they need Febreze?

So P&G hired a research company to interview people about how they used the product. They heard that those who sprayed Febreze did so to freshen a room as part of their house cleaning routine, not to hide odors.

As a result, the company positioned Febreze as a product to enhance your current routine. Within two months, sales of the product doubled.

3. Your website

Most marketers analyze your site data to gain insights into things like how many people visited in a given time period, what your most popular landing pages are, and what keywords people are using to find them.

However, by taking analytics to the next level and capturing behavior, you can learn even more about what your audience is doing. From where they scroll on a given page to heatmaps that show what content they’re engaging with, there are plenty of tools out there that can show you what your visitors want and need from you.

Hotjar uses heat maps to understand the users of some of the biggest brands in the world.

4. Social networks

Platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram can be valuable places to collect data about your visitors and followers.

By watching what your audience is doing, engaging with people who engage with your brand, and starting conversations, you can learn a lot about the people who are interested in your brand.

Additionally, social media now serves as a customer service platform; Instead of writing a letter or email to a company, people now turn to social media to praise or complain.

As tempting as it may be to delete negative comments or ignore them in the hope that they will soon be buried, don’t! As Bill Gates said: “Your most dissatisfied customers are your greatest source of learning.”

For many entrepreneurs and business owners, the online marketing scene can be very confusing and overwhelming. All that marketing terminology being thrown around constantly on a daily basis is enough to make one cover one’s head and hope it will all go away.

This blog article explores how to create landing pages that will help boost your marketing efforts. Read more.

Consumer expectations are higher than ever, and it’s critical to understand the people who potentially buy what you’re selling.

By using the right Voice of Customer tools, you can be sure to give your audience exactly what they want, when and how they want it.

Does your business use VoC tools to help collect vital customer data?