Customers are Talking. Are You Listening?

The term Customer Experience is used to describe the interactions consumers have with brands, product offerings, price, customer support, website usability, and so on. Today, 84% of organizations are competing on customer experience, with 75% of consumers believing that customer experience is the clear indicator for how much a company values them (Forbes.com). With so much time and money being invested by businesses to improve overall customer experience, the easiest tasks to achieve results – like LISTENING to customers – are sometimes neglected. World populations are “sheltering-in” as a result of the global pandemic. This has given businesses a great opportunity to take time and listen to their customers. Quarantined consumers are confined to using social networks, blogs, forums, news groups and other online media channels to share their opinions and sentiment. For companies seeking to understand audience perception levels towards their business, the wealth of VoC (voice-of-the-consumer) data has never been greater. The stats below reveal that people all over the world have been spending considerably more time on their digital devices as a result of coronavirus lockdowns compared to their pre-lockdown behaviors:

The smart companies know that marketplace data can serve as a leading indicator for business performance in the future. Insights gained by analyzing VoC data can help to navigate towards techniques for improving products, services and the overall customer experience. A few examples for how businesses can gain an advantage:

• Airlines can monitor concerns and anxieties towards flights and communicate how they are taking the right actions to instill passenger confidence
• Restaurants can listen to patrons to understand what they will want the most from them to ensure their safety and comfort once their tables re-open for seating
• Universities can monitor the sentiment and perception towards distance learning and improve the online teaching experience for students and faculty
• Sports organizations can listen to what fans miss the most from the arena or stadium experience and capitalize on those insights for future games and events
• OEMs can gain insights to properly evaluate existing work-environment health and safety policies and introduce new protocols which will enable workforce peace of mind
• Tech companies can listen for which product features help consumers to be more productive during social distancing – and which features do not

The pandemic will end. Businesses will reopen. Life will move forward. How will you “listen to your customers” today and enable your business to better serve them in the future?