VOC Program Foundations
- Assign a program owner
- Secure executive sponsorship and embed feedback into leadership and review processes
- Allocate sufficient resources (budget, people, time)
- Build internal branding for awareness and sustainability
- Train customer-facing teams to engage with and act on (customer) feedback
- Educate customers on the program’s purpose and benefit
Survey Sample & Contact List
- Source contact data from a centralized CRM system
- Include multiple contacts per account to ensure comprehensive feedback
- Tag contacts with appropriate demographic data for individual and account level analyses
Survey Questionnaire Design
- Keep survey completion time to around 10 minutes
- Limit to fewer than 30 data points / questions
- Tailor questions to each respondent’s role
- Allow participants to opt out of irrelevant questions
- Key areas of measurement:
- Team performance
- Product / Service evaluation
- Organizational alignment
- Competitive alignment
- Short / Long term goals and priorities
Launch & Communication Process
- Launch surveys at scheduled intervals (e.g. annually or semi-annually)
- Send pre-survey notifications outlining purpose and benefits
- Survey invite should include specifics on time commitment and closing date
- Follow-up with reminders to non-completes
- Craft unique subject lines to boost response and avoid SPAM filters
- Establish survey alerts to notify appropriate team members of feedback that requires their (immediate) attention
- Send a Thank You message post survey completion
- Close the loop communication(s) to customers that shares relevant learnings and actions from the survey.
VOC Analytics
- Calculate ratings at both question and topic levels
- Enable real-time access to results
- Ensure cross-functional visibility for customer-facing teams via shared platforms and tools
- Apply advanced analytics to uncover drivers of customer commitment and satisfaction
- Present and distribute findings to internal stakeholders and business units
General VOC Practices
- Use identifiable, web-based surveys to link data to individuals/accounts (when appropriate)
- Conduct personal interviews for select high-level customers
- Incorporate results into internal and external planning processes.
- Create action plans based upon survey results
- Use customer feedback (and insights) to celebrate customer wins and fuel improvements
Learn more about VOC Program Best Practices