Customer Survey

Van Bennekom Book

Introduction

• Surveying has become a commonplace tool on the business landscape due to the drive of the quality management.

• Customer-centered business to hear the voice of the customer

• Surveying is the way of listening

Introduction

• Surveying is a range of information gathering activities; a process of examining some area of interest.

• One of the ways to do survey is to use questionnaire to collect data.

• Survey is a overall process, while questionnaire is one of the instruments to achieve the goal of survey.

Terms

• Survey: the overall process• Questionnaire/instrument: the way to do survey• Population• Sample• Respondents

• The goal of customer survey is to identify reality as perceived by customers to give you the information to form good action plans to improve those perceptions

Why customer surveys

• To improve customer services• Retain customers• Increase their satisfaction

• Type of surveys– Special-purpose as needed surveys– Periodic surveys– Transaction-driven surveys(e.g. quality control)

Pitfall on survey

• Validity: do the questions on the instrument truly measure what we intend them to measure?

• Reliability: does every respondent interpret the questions on the instrument in the same way?

Pitfall on survey• Lack of clearly stated criteria for evaluation• Questions that do not apply to respondent• Examples that lead responses• Unreasonable recall expectations (do not try to let respondents to recall things

happened long time ago)• Ambiguous wording• Combination questions (ask one question at one time)• Leading or loaded questions (neutral)• Improper sequencing of questions

• Bias of targeting the wrong respondents• Bias in the sample generation• Bias in the respondent group• Statistical bias

Key stages of a survey project

• Project planning• Survey development• Administration (distribution and data

collection)• Analysis and reporting• Take action• Repeat process for continuous feedback

Planning a survey project

• Statement of purpose (figure 3.2 as an example)– Why conduct a survey– Who is the target population?

What actions do you plan to take with the results?

– Available resources– Budget

Survey development

• Step 1: identify the attributes to be measured in the survey

• Step 2: actual design the survey instrument• Step 3: pilot test

Design Questionnaires

• Chapter 4: page 56-115.

Survey administration

• Step 1: select an administration method (whether needs to buy tools or instruments)

• Step 2: identify the target population (distribution and accessibility of the customer database)

• Step 3: actual administration (send questionnaires by mail, etc.)

Survey administration

• Choosing an administration method– Email, mail, phone, web-based,– Criteria: response rate, speed of administration,

cost, scalability, ability to provide feedback, administration control, (figure 5.1)

Target the population

• Who are our targets• How to sample the population?– Random sample– Stratified samples

• Increase response rates– Whether responses from the sample properly reflect

the sample– Using compelling subject line– Sending reminder notes– Use of Thank You gifts

Analyzing survey data and reporting

• Handling missing data– Discard the whole questionnaire– Discard one the unanswered questions– Do not zero-fill responses or fill with a neutral

value– Correct fixed-sum question entries– Cleaning textual data– Segmenting data (e.g. geographical location)

• Statistical analysis

reporting

• Survey report includes– Why did you conduct the survey– How to conduct– The findings for each question– The findings for survey as a whole– Conclusions– recommendations

Reporting

• Sections– Executive summary– Methodology of the study– Detailed findings– Conclusions– recommendations

Taking action

• Follow-up research• Service recovery actions– Complaint-handling activity