Are You Listening to Your Customers?
Today, Mila D’Antonio posted an article on the 1to1 Blog titled “Turn Up the Volume on Customer Listening.” In the article, D’Antonio provides strong examples of companies that are effectively putting the voice of the customer to work within their organization. One example especially caught my eye:
iRobot: By conversing with customers, the company unearths valuable pieces of data that would otherwise go undiscovered. Maryellen Abreu, director of global technical support, hosts a monthly voice-of-the-customer meeting where executives review customer feedback that reps have collected. They address the top five issues and make hundreds of changes to products over a course of a year as a result of the feedback.
I imagine “voice of the customer” or customer feedback meetings to be powerful sessions where ideas are unhatched, products are improved, and systems are streamlined. All because the team took the time to review customer feedback. But, it got me wondering: are voice of the customer meetings actually listening to the voices of their customers, complete with the inflection and emotion that is conveyed, or are comments organized into lists and check boxes for review?
How much more powerful would your customer feedback sessions be if you could listen to the actual recording of the customer interaction, exported directly from your customer service contact center? The words spoken would come to life, and take on more meaning than simple words on the page. Evangelists would shine through the recordings, rather than reading as “just another happy customer.”
If your company is already recording calls, how can you leverage those business assets outside of the contact center? Is your call recording system equipped to export individual call recordings and play the files back on any standard desktop media platform? What teams, like order fulfillment or product development, could benefit from hearing directly from customers?
How are you putting the interactions that you’re having every day with customers to work within your organization?