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Listening to Customers is Not Enough: You Have to Act and Adapt. By Dr. Lucia Kelleher
08/05/09

Voice of the customer (VOC) is the engine that enables business to find out why customers purchase their product or service, as opposed to a competitors product or service, as well as identifying any issues customers have with the product/service or the organisations ability to service the customer.

The intelligence obtained from carrying out a VOC data collection exercise allows companies to improve their customers experience, create more relevant and successful products/services, build loyalty, and ultimately acquire new customers through advocacy.
Despite its benefits, many companies aren’t capitalizing on VOC. The key to VOC is to unearth all drivers of purchase with existing customers in relation to the market:

• from satisfaction with the product/service;
• customer service;
• impact of brand; and
• the customers relationship with staff at all touch points of the business  

The data from VOC will in turn inform decisions across the board in the organisation to optimise business improvement and ultimately maintain and increase profitibility.

To fully integrate and align the organization around the customer, organizations must involve all employees in the improvement strategies. If serious issues arise from the VOC data then representation from all employees is needed to help clarify the root cause of customer issues and design solutions.

By engaging frontline employees, the company is able to gain relevant insight from the very people that affect the customer experience. In addition, it brings a sense of ownership that increases the likelihood of organisational buy-in and adoption of changes. The importance of this factor should never be under-estimated.

Understanding the customer experience and areas for improvement from both the customer and employee perspective is crucial to retaining and acquiring customers.

While many companies understand this concept, finding a way to easily and effectively identify root cause of dissatisfaction and prioritize action is a challenge.

As companies look for ways to improve the customer experience and respond to the voice of the customer, they will benefit from a comprehensive analysis of the root cause of customer concerns to prioritize improvement actions.

By identifying root cause and closing the loop with customers, companies can greatly improve the customer experience, resulting in improved retention, repurchase and referrals.