And why are businesses so bad at dealing with constructive criticism?
“Tell us how we did”, “How was your experience?”, “Would you recommend us?”
How many times do companies ask you for feedback and how many times do you give it? And if you do give it, how often is it acted upon?
Businesses are very quick to ask these questions, aren’t they? But they tend to also be very slow at acting on anything. This has been evidenced again today in research published by Serve First which revealed that businesses take an average of 13 DAYS to fix a customer’s issue once it has been identified! How many other customers are also being affected by the same issue during that time?! See the full report. Cx is Broken: Why Operational Excellence is the future of customer experience.
The findings don’t surprise me. When I ask my social media followers why they don’t give feedback there are a few reasons. But the most common is that they tell me they have stopped giving feedback because businesses pay lip service to it. They have taken the time to explain what went wrong, sometimes repeatedly, and seen nothing improve. The message is clear: repeatedly asking customers for their views without acting on them can undermine the very relationship a business is saying that they are aiming to improve. Eventually, customers just stop bothering and many cease shopping with the business altogether.
Businesses should take note! Silence should not be taken as satisfaction!
Background
The research wasn’t even based on what consumers said. It was based on the findings from 250 UK customer experience leaders and decision-makers. It found that:
- Just 14% said their businesses typically resolve an identified customer issue within a day.
- More than a third (34%) said it takes at least a week.
- More than half (55%) said too many customer issues remain unresolved despite being identified.
- Some 56% said traditional customer experience platforms make problems easier to identify than to solve.
- The same proportion said customer insight does not reach frontline teams quickly enough.
These are businesses’ own assessments of their performance. The survey does not mean every individual complaint takes 13 days to resolve. It does, however, highlight what many of us suspected, the “experts” also know it takes far too long to resolve issues!
Why ask for feedback then not fix the problem?
If a business asks for your opinion, you expect someone to consider it, don’t you? You give it because you think it will make a difference. Not every suggestion is going to be agreed but at least acknowledging the time you took to explain your experiences would be something. But it appears that companies do more in recording the failure than putting effort into resolving matters.
Customer Experience Platforms
Serve First’s research found that organisations use an average of 3.4 customer experience platforms, with 87% using at least two. No wonder we feel bombarded!
But only 6% of respondents said they spend most of their time driving operational improvements. What on earth are the other 94% doing with the feedback they asked for? Oh, of course, they are ignoring it.
Many businesses seem very good at recording dissatisfaction but diabolical at addressing any of the causes or impact. Information sits in different systems, reports go to people who cannot or don’t want to fix the problem and frontline staff may never receive the details they need in the first place.
Erol Ayvaz, CEO and co-founder of Serve First, comments:
A lot of businesses have invested heavily in collecting feedback, but the handover into day-to-day operations is still too slow. The person who sees the report is often not the one running the site and the problem might need to be fixed by a different team or supplier. When those people are working across different systems, even feedback highlighting a serious customer problem can quickly lose momentum.”
Top three Complaints
In my role as a consumer expert I hear numerous issues regarding customer service on a daily basis. There are a number of things that consumer complain about but the top three are probably:
- Not listening to feedback, whether positive or negative.
- Not taking ownership of a problem through to resolution.
- Not following through on promises.
These are some basic requirements of good customer service.
Customer Service is Key
I regularly advise businesses to make customer service a leading investment priority. It costs at least five times more to gain a new customer than it does to retain one, so it just simple common sense and maths to invest more in customer service than markting! It affects whether customers return, what they tell other people and what they write in reviews.
Everyone makes mistakes, it’s how they deal with them that matters. Customers talking positively about how complaints have been handled, whether by word of mouth or in reviews. It is free marketing and advertising.
Download the free guide 5 ways to gain reviews and referrals.
Research Source
It should be noted that the research was carried out by a customer service experience management software company because that may account for 75% of respondents agreeing that improving customer experience starts with improving business operations. Or that another 71% believe customer experience should form part of a broader operational excellence strategy! Clearly businesses are not handling complaints well enough and we all know that.
Businesses must acknowledge and act upon what customers say. After all, without them they won’t have a business. Businesses can thrive and grow by listening more closely to customers about what they want.
Reward your customers for feedback
How to exceed customer expectations and why you should do it
Advice for Businesses
Please see How The Complaining Cow can help businesses for the different ways you can work with me to improve your complaint handling, customer service and increase your sales. If you are a small business see my Power Hours to discuss issues affecting your business and help with creative solutions.
For consumers and businesses!
If you want help with a complaint and don’t want a business taking 13 days or more to deal with it start with Top 20 Tips on how to complain effectively and How to Complain which includes over 60 templates.
How to Complain: The Essential Consumer Guide to Getting Refunds, Redress and Results!
101 Habits of an Effective Complainer
How to Get free Pr and Be Paid for It 280 ways to raise your business profile
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