Secrets to Getting Feedback Online and the Best Tools to Achieve it
One of the most important things you need to keep tabs on, aside from relevant news in the industry you’re in, is what your customers are thinking about your brand and what it can offer. This comes as a surprise to some people, but I’m telling you now that if you want to keep your business relevant you’ll need to start paying attention to what the customers are saying.
This sure is a good time to have telepathic powers, but alas! We’ll have to find another way to do this, and luckily for us we won’t need to undergo genetic mutation to get into our customer’s minds. The information that we’ll get from customers through customer surveys or polls will help improve our product and service, and maybe use these to create new offers for them.
Different Ways to Get Customer Feedback
There are different ways to gather data. But before we delve into that, you need to take note of a few things. The last thing people want to do when they’re surfing the web is to have to answer anything. We don’t want to disturb the customer flow so we want to be able to ask them for feedback without being invasive of their personal web space.
Create a Survey
In my opinion, making surveys is the best way to get qualitative data online. One of the things you can do is to link the survey form in any of your content or once a customer finishes a purchase. But the most non-invasive way to survey customers is through slider-surveys.
Slider surveys are microsurveys you see that slide up on the side of the screen. Customers may choose to answer your questions for later by just dropping it down for a while. Other people are having problems with microsurveys because these can be pretty limiting, so you must ask specific questions. But think about it, the answers you’ll get will be specific as well.
So the best thing to do before running a microsurvey is to evaluate which part of the funnel is having problems. Is the cart being abandoned too many times lately? Is there a product that doesn’t get noticed? Is there a product that used to get more sales that is not selling well now? These are some of the things you need to find out before crafting your survey questions.
There are also tools that you can use to help you evaluate your website. For instance, CrazyEgg can provide you with heat maps and analytics so that you’ll know which parts of your website isn’t getting that much attention.
Now, if you really need long form surveys you can always opt to do that. Just make sure that it’s not going to interrupt anything. Instead of getting the answers you need, your customers might find it annoying to have to answer one before making a purchase.
Survey Monkey is one of the most popular choices for custom, long-form surveys. For microsurveys you can use tools like Qeryz so you can conduct a survey without being too invasive of your customer’s web space.
When crafting a survey just remember these:
- Don’t ask irrelevant questions. Always ask questions that have purpose.
- Avoid leading questions so that your customer’s answers aren’t biased in any way
- Try to make open-ended questions so that your customers can elaborate on specific things about your product
- When you provide a rating scale for your customers, make sure that it’s consistent all through-out. Surprisingly, there are surveys with different kinds of rating scales.
Make Use of Social Media Platforms
The reason this is such an effective way to get feedback is because you can always make it fun and engaging. Ask a question per day or maybe start a #QOTD (Question of the Day) trend so that your customers can already expect that they’re going to be asked about their opinions every day.
You don’t even need to ask serious questions every single day. Maybe try something playful like asking them about how their day went and so on. This helps strengthen your customer engagement so that when you do get to ask them serious questions, they will answer without feeling like they are being intruded. You can try making a game out of it, even!
But its effectiveness will not just depend on the kinds of questions you ask; it will also depend the words that you’ll use. Make sure to use words that are appropriate, learn about terms that you shouldn’t use. Sometimes one misunderstanding or misinterpretation because of a specific term can spell trouble for you and your brand.
Provide a Feedback Box
Other than microsurveys, another non-interrupting, non-invasive way of getting feedback is through Feedback Boxes on your website. The reason it isn’t annoying customers is because you can put this at the bottom of the page or at the end of the purchasing funnel when they’ve already bought any of your products.
Its simplicity is also not daunting, so customers will likely answer it. It’s simply a box asking for their opinions.
Send It through E-mail
Because of the proliferation of different tools and apps, the e-mail shouldn’t be neglected. Now, it’s trickier than what has been mentioned above, but with a little effort, feedback through e-mail is quite effective.
First, you need to understand that customers want results, so you have to assure them that you will work on their feedback once they give it. There will be customers who want to see the results in product improvement, while some might want a response from you in the form of text or data. Take note of those things. If you need to, create a board with a list of ideas that have come from the customers and note which ones asked for results from you.
Second, you can utilize e-mail feedback by making it personal. When customers sign-up to your website, they usually get an automatic response from you welcoming them and thanking them for subscribing. This is a great opportunity to get the ball rolling by asking them first what made them subscribe, and allow them to reply to you. They will not feel pressured when they reply because this isn’t a public platform and it is quite personal because it’s an exchange between the both of you. Just make sure to respond to them either to thank them or explain something to them.
Customer feedback can help shape your business and guide your decisions in the right direction. These are some of the fool-proof techniques to get that coveted customer feedback. Try some of these out, apply what you’ve learnt, and see the results!
