7 Proven Ways to Improve Customer Satisfaction with Website Feedback

Website feedback is valuable for collecting qualitative data and the best way to improve your customer satisfaction. If you aren’t convinced yet, check this article for deeper insight.

However, you might ask some questions at this moment, such as “How do I start? What are the benefits for me? How can I use website feedback to improve Customer Satisfaction?” Well, I could say that you should act on your intuition, but some people need certain guidance, because intuition itself will lead them nowhere. You may lack inspiration or simple ideas to push you forward and to apply knowledge gathered from feedback to your strategies on increasing customer satisfaction.

The other problem is that it is quite hard a task to manage data coming from voice of customer, and if the data is somehow managed, it often goes down the drain. There are plenty of such problems, but do not fear. In this article, I will show you some useful tips, so that you know how to operate your website feedback in a right way, having your Customer Satisfaction improved. Please, have a seat, take your favorite drink, and enjoy the knowledge!

Focus

First and foremost, simply deciding that you want to conduct a VoC will give you nothing. It will lead to the process where you just collect data and don’t act upon it at all.

You have to find your focus and ask yourself “what do I want to achieve?” and the answer for this question should be your main theme. Whether you want to find the leading trends on the market or you just want to improve the customer experience, just pick one principle.

Once you find your focus, you will be able to easily apply the data you’ve gathered.

Narrow it

Your first idea may be to send surveys and feedback request to everyone, but think about it; does it sound reasonable to expect qualitative results for your goal, when you send your surveys even to those who have no interest in the topic?

For instance, if you ask everyone browsing your page if your shopping cart is working, whereas most of them didn’t even care to use it, why should you bother them with an issue they have no connection with? Narrow your groups which will be questioned or surveyed.

Be quick to act

The worst thing you could do is getting the data and throw it into oblivion. Such behavior will not serve to improve your Customer Satisfaction with website feedback; it will do the opposite.

If your customers and users are signaling you problems – address them immediately. Otherwise they will not feel important. They won’t feel that you care for their opinion and this will be the flashpoint to losing your customers’ loyalty, which is even more important than their satisfaction (check this article for more details on customer loyalty). You don’t want your customers to be dissatisfied – so do not let it happen.

An extra tip is to try to automate the gathering process by engaging your people right after their transactions (but don’t attack them with a huge pop-up, try for example e-mail). This displays your engagement and actually might incline people to provide their feedback immediately, as the matter is still fresh.

Don’t be happy with satisfaction – pursue perfection

According to Christian Vanek, it’s better to think that all customers are potentially unsatisfied, since even if they are presently happy with our product, once we’ve improved it, they will be unsatisfied with the earlier version. If you ran out of the ideas on improving your website, you might start getting afraid about the future of the company. Look for passion, not sheer satisfaction. You want all the aesthetic zealots and happy customers to share their ideas with you. Satisfaction alone is not enough.

Treat your customers like they are your boss

“It is not the employer who pays the wages. Employers only handle the money. It is the customer who pays the wages.” – Henry Ford.

You have to understand that your customer is your paycheck. With no customers, there is no money to pay you. If you’re not getting paid, your business is worthless and it leaves you with an empty wallet.

It is essential to thank all your customers for their business, and actually mean it. Be thankful for their support, because without them, you wouldn’t get your paychecks.

Send an email (even an automated one), in which you will tell them how grateful you are for their attention and the time spent on purchasing your product and using your services. Your boss will be satisfied.

Make their life easier

Imagine that you are watching “Back to the Future” in 2015. What is your impression on that movie from an adult’s perspective? Yeah, the movie’s not impressive at all. The ideas presented in it might have been catchy 20 years ago, but now they are nothing innovative. Then imagine how you will look at the movie in 20 years from now. Your reaction will be probably something like “Sweet Jesus, that stuff is so outdated!”

You don’t want such reactions to happen to your customers. The purpose of VoC is that you can find out where you made mistake. You act on customer feedback, not on sheer deduction, which may sometimes be misleading.

Thanks to your users’ responses you will quickly pinpoint the area which needs your attention, and in result you will be able to make your customers’ lives easier. Given this, you will improve their experiences with your website.

Change approach

Many years ago, one would say that in order to find out what customers want, one should ask them about it. This approach involves an outdated thinking pattern, since it excludes innovative and creative thinking.

As Steve Jobs said

“People don’t know what they want, until you show it to them”.

Yes, you should ask your customers for their feedback, and yes, you should do it in an extraordinary way. Don’t ask directly. Give them tools to identify what objects on your website, or what elements of your navigation makes them frustrated. After that, find a solution to their problems and show it to them. This is how the cookie crumbles.

The Final Word: Number 7

There are some tools on the market like UsabilityTools to start implementing those steps I mentioned above. I have given you 7 proven ways of increasing customer satisfaction with website feedback. Seven is a lucky number for many. But remember, it’s just a symbol.

In Customer Experience there is no luck, there are numbers. Behind that numbers stand feelings and troubles of your users. Use these tips and approach your users in the best way possible.

What are your ways to improve Customer Satisfaction with website feedback? Let us know in the comment section so that we will contribute to your ideas in the future.

The story was delivered by Sezgin Hergul.

Sezgin Hergül is the marketing manager at UsabilityTools. He specializes in content marketing and website growth. Besides his love for marketing, he enjoys good design and music.