How To Measure Client Satisfaction
In all sales management training course I have ever been on the issue of getting
every salesperson to find out the client's needs and then meet these needs has been of interest to all attendees. This key subject of ensuring customer satisfaction appears at the top of most sales manager's priority lists. After all ensuring your clients are utterly satisfied with the products and services you supply is decisive if you want to ensure the on-going success of your organisation.
Despite this, how many companies really know how satisfied their clients are? Often the managers in charge shy away from exploring client satisfaction as a result of prejudices against satisfaction analyses.
Only 28% of companies regularly assess the satisfaction of their clients according to a study carried out by the WHU in Koblenz under the supervision of Professor Christian Homburg.
The survey involved 1,000 marketing and sales managers from industrial goods companies. The survey not only provides information about the current state of client satisfaction assessment. It also shows the uses client satisfaction surveys offer and provides recommendations which can be implemented in practice.
Which client groups are targeted in client satisfaction assessments? Most companies limit themselves to asking existing clients. Potential clients, on the other hand, are seldom asked. This selection appears completely sensible, bearing in mind that new client acquisition is considerably more expensive than caring for existing clients. Therefore the key priority is to ensure existing customers are happy.
Who is asked? Product users or decision makers are generally asked. Unfortunately most companies tend to limit themselves to asking only one person.
You should take into account, however, that one person can reasonably assess just one part of a supplier's performance, not the whole. It is therefore important to ask several people from different areas within the client's company to get the whole picture.
What do companies ask? As the data for the following question shows, client satisfaction analyses tend to concentrate on the technical service side and the product.
Companies should bear in mind the fact that other processes in order processing/logistics, quality of client care by the sales department and delivery times are comparatively seldom investigated.
Which performance criteria are assessed? Technical service 90%; Product 84%; Company (in general) 74%; Order processing/logistics 68%; Sales department client care 66%; Comparison with competitors 58%; Delivery times 55%; Other 13%.
Note: It is precisely in these "other" areas that gaps in performance lie.
Companies who limit themselves to assessing only technical service and product are losing a substantial amount of information about client satisfaction.
How and how often are clients questioned? Personal questionnaires are used by about 68% of the companies surveyed to assess client satisfaction. In more than half the companies asked (58%) this is carried out by their own salespeople. Herein lies one of the critical points of satisfaction analyses. Clients feedback can be distorted by the presence of an interviewer, this is especially true if the sales people interview the customer.
Experts believe that it is illusory to try and collect objective information about client satisfaction in this way. The only way to collect reliable information is to have a written questionnaire.
Also unsatisfactory are the results showing how regularly assements on customer satisfaction are performed. Only 11% of the companies asked carry out annual assessments.
What prejudices do companies have against client satisfaction assessments? The problems of client satisfaction analyses are generally overestimated. Oft-quoted problems of resources (time, personnel, cost intensity) and uncertainty about know-how are over-rated.
It can be concluded from the experiences of organisations that carry out customer satisfaction analysis: The problems which arise during client satisfaction analyses are relatively minor.
90% of the companies asked believe that the use of carrying out such an analysis, on the other hand, is high to very high.
A dangerous misapprehension is the assumption that companies can form an opinion about client satisfaction by purely looking at complaint statistics. Surveys have shown that only 15% of unsatisfied clients make complaints. According to the leader of the WHU study, Professor Christian Homburg, "Any company which limits itself to complaint statistics is only concentrating on the tip of the iceberg."
What recommendations can we draw from the survey results for assessing client satisfaction that can be fed back as good practice to the sales managers responsible for measuring customer satisfaction via management training?
1. Assess client satisfaction on a permanent basis and systematically. This is the only way of being able to draw comparisons and it is the only way to make mistakes visible.
2. Do not make the common mistake of believing that internal surveys and complaint statistics are sufficient indicators of client satisfaction.Only a minority make complaints.
3. Incorrect internal surveys can lead to making the wrong decision so use external know-how.
4. Bear in mind the complex decision-making structures in your clients' companies. Your analyses should therefore not concentrate only on one person, otherwise you will miss vital information.
5. Do not be put off by potential problems. Many problems are over-rated and the uses that you can gain from client satisfaction analyses are considerably greater than any obstacles.
6. And last, but not least: do not sweep the results of your client satisfaction analysis under the carpet. Use the information that you have acquired and implement the requisite measures in your company to increase client satisfaction. Your management training sessions should include the results so that the awareness of all managers on what they need to do in their departments to improve customer care is increased.
by: Richard Stone
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