Distributors looking to gain market share in a competitive environment must ensure their products and services are meeting customer demands. But implementing a system of accountability requires a change in culture, says Joseph Michelli, chief experience officer at The Michelli Experience, in Measuring the Customer Experience.
Implementing a customer feedback system, such as the Net Promoter Score or Customer Effort Score, can cause fear in an organization that the system is creating a “witch hunt,” or looking for people to blame for customer disputes, Michelli says. But if a company institutes the system from a top-down perspective and focuses on enabling employees to resolve customer disputes, it can create a culture of accountability and empowerment within the company.
“No longer am I in the business of getting product from point A to point B,” says Michelli, whose consulting firm is focused on customer experience.“I’m in the business of building loyal customers.”
Along with internal concerns, distributors should be careful about inundating customers with constant survey questions, he says. It’s all about striking the right balance. “How can you ask the customer with enough frequency to be able to operationally adjust your business, but without too much frequency that it’s going to annoy them?” he says.
Read about different metrics that provide customer feedback and how to implement them in Measuring the Customer Experience.
