February 25th is “Better Business Communication Day.” In honor of that, let’s look at one powerful way you might do a better job of communicating with your customers. Customer surveys are a great way to find out what your customers want!
Have you ever used a customer survey in your business? Customer surveys can help you learn many things about your customers and help you to better understand and communicate with them.
A Customer Survey can help you:
- Provide better customer service
- Gain an understanding of the level of customer satisfaction you are providing
- Help you in your customer relationship management
- Learn about customer complaints
- Provide a thorough customer experience
- Develop customer loyality
- Improve customer retention
- and more!
Let’s look at just a couple of examples. Say you own a pizza parlor. How important to you is it to know what your customers favorite kind of pizza is? How much more effective and how many more pepperoni pizzas could you sell if you marketed specifically to this group of people? How much greater would your return on investment be if you could run a special on veggie or pepperoni pizza to JUST those customers who you know are either vegetarians or love pepperoni pizza?
Suppose you own a retail business of some sort. How important is it to know what your customers favorite brands are? How much more effective would it be to advertise new products and inventory to people you already know love what you’ve got and how much more satisfied are your customers going to be receiving exactly what they like and want from you?
Some other examples:
- a jewelry store knowing their customers birthstone or anniversary date.
- a bar & grill knowing your customers favorite beer.
- a winery knowing what kind of wines customers like. (wine clubs)
- a casual dining restaurant knowing if their customers have kids. (kids eat free, special kids menus)
- a veterinary clinic knowing what other services customers might need. (kennel, doggy daycare)
- a hair salon knowing what special events are coming up in their customers lives. (weddings, proms)
- an auto repair shop knowing how many miles are on a vehicle.
Now suppose you could take the survey information and form it into specialized or “hot” lists like:
- Pepperoni pizza lovers
- Those with July birthdays
- White wine lovers
- Those who use professional nail services.
- Those who use doggy daycare.
- Oil changes and tire rotations due in March
Getting and sorting this information is easy when you use text message surveys and mobile marketing messages. Better communication includes knowing what your customers want and giving it to them. We can help you with that. Let us show you how simple and inexpensive it is to get started by scheduling a free consultation to discuss the specifics of how we can help your business develop surveys and marketing strategies that your customers will welcome and respond to.
Are you starting to see how beneficial this kind of information could be to your business? Would you like to know more?
Start by calling us today! In the Charleston area call 843-647-0489. Throughout the U.S. dial toll free 866-945-9707. Then download your free copy of the Small Business Guide to Mobile Marketing for a look at what else mobile marketing can do for your business.
To better communication,
This is an excellent article! I agree, it is all about learning our customer’s needs and wants. Surveys are a great way to do this! Also, it may bring to our attention, something we never even knew the client wanted! Thanks for posting this!
Thank you Alexandra and you are exactly right. Staying on top of what our customers want is what it’s all about. So many businesses start taking things for granted without remembering to ask their own customers what they want and how they think we are doing. As you know, it’s much easier to keep a customer that it is to find a new one! Surveys just make it easy to do and most people like being asked their opinions.
I haven’t used a customer survey yet, I think it is time to do so! Thanks for laying it out so clearly and sharing it with us!
Good to know you’ll use the info! Thanks for your comment.
Customer surveys are excellent and imperative tools in marketing. Thanks for the post!
I love taking surveys. They make me feel like someone is listening. Thanks for this great post.
I think most people feel like you do. It feels like your opinions are important to a company when they take the time to ask. Thanks for your comment Michele.
This is a great way to assess what you may be missing in your business.
I like surveys, I find that they work especially well when a prize is involved : )
This is a great idea and I haven’t tried it yet! I really need to do this!!! I need some tips from my visitors and I want to know how to better serve them!
Feedback surveys are an excellent way of keeping your finger on the pulse of your customers. Sometimes, you can uncover issues you weren’t even aware of if the survey taker is honest with you and will provide comments. Great article Leigha!
You sure can Rod! You can find out what’s working and what’s not. Thanks for commenting.
Very good! I use Constant Contact’s survey tool. I like the way they present the data. It is very flexible and I can customize it with my own design elements.
Hey Lorrie, Thanks for the comment. I’ve heard of Constant Contact but I’ve never used them. I’d be interested in hearing what your open rate is along with the response rate to the surveys you send out. Using mobile surveys, I’m finding I get about a 99% open rate and about a 75% response rate!
Great post, Leigha! Customer surveys are very important! I ask my clients for their input into different products and/or services, etc. that I maybe thinking about implementing. It may not actually be survey, sort of speak, but I do use it as a guide, as I value their opinion. Thank you 🙂
That’s great Susan! It’s important to ask for feedback. However, I’ve found that sometimes my customers will tell me something in a survey that they won’t say to me directly. Especially if it’s negative feedback. Thanks for your kind words Susan, and thanks for taking the time to comment.
Never considered a survey. Thanks for great info. I love and do business with companies who understand EXCELLENT like I give Apple that rating in their customer service.
I’ve never tried a survey, but I will now!
Wow, I just really learned a lot right there. Mobile marketing is going to be smoking hot when people catch on to it! Thanks for sharing all the ideas.
Thanks Leigha, you give some wonderful examples here. I agree, short and direct surveys can do wonders for your business. The key for me as a customer is they can’t take too much time to complete! I’ll admit that I haven’t ventured into the mobile marketing arena at all. I’m looking forward to learning more about it from you.
Hey Jennifer,
I hear you loud and clear on the importance of making surveys quick to complete. Not only do we all seem to have too much to do in our lives but we also seem to have short attention spans. Much greater results are obtained from focusing on the information you want or need at the time.
The best part about doing mobile surveys is that because of the unique relationship people have with their mobile phones, the survey (sent in a text message) gets opened 98% of the time and 95% of the time it’s opened by your customer within 4 minutes of them receiving it. If the survey is done correctly, it’s a quick interaction that takes place between the sender and receiver of the message and the survey results are available almost immediately.
Thanks for your comment Jennifer and be sure to let me know if I can be of further assistance in answering any questions you might have.
Kindest regards,
Leigha
Wow…one more powerful tool to use! Thank you!
It’s pretty fascinating – we think we know what our customers want and we go about giving them what we think they want…but if you take a moment to ASK what they want, the answers can be very surprising,and can lead you in a whole new direction….a successful one! Mobile marketing is the new way to rock your business world!