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The other day, I was waiting for our food at a restaurant with friends, which was taking too long. Luckily, before we complained, they delivered the food. Later, the manager came by twice and asked how everything was. In both cases, we all said, “It’s fine.”
Why didn’t we tell him about how long we waited for the food? What compelled me to reassure him that we thought everything was fine?
I am not the only customer that does this. Dave Hillman wrote us with a pickle. His customers tell him one thing but then give us a bad score later. He wants to know how to get the feedback upfront.
Now, I can’t speak for all of Hillman’s customers, but in my restaurant example, I blame my lack of upfront feedback on being British. We don’t like conflict as a country; we find it embarrassing.
Plus, there is a lot of embarrassment to follow if you complain in person at a restaurant. First, the waiter apologizes. Then, the manager will come over and apologize, maybe even offer a free dessert or drinks or something. It’s all right to do, but it’s also embarrassing. Plus, then I feel guilty that I might have overreacted.
I also feel terrible complaining to an employee because it’s not always that employee. Sure, they’re the ones who are interfacing with you, but it might have been someone else in the chain that caused the problem.
Therefore, be aware that in-person complaints have a lot of personal costs, and not everyone is willing to pay them. Anonymity is key for many people. It allows them to be honest at a much lower personal cost.
Sometimes, the complaints process exacerbates the problem with getting real feedback. For example, I have private insurance in the UK and have noticed a decline in customer service over the past few months. I wanted to tell the agent’s manager as much but learned that she could only do that if I filed one through a formal complaint process. I didn’t want to do all that, so I skipped it.
Let’s take a closer look at that policy. For a customer to give honest feedback that could be potentially useful to the company, the company places an extra burden on the customer to “allow” them to do that. Not bloody likely that they are going to get the feedback then, is it?
A few weeks ago, you might recall that I told you about our discussion with Tim Waterton of Happy or Not where we discussed the importance of getting feedback quickly after the experience. That’s because right after an experience, or even during it, we have different perceptions of the experience. If we have just waited a long time for food in a restaurant, we will feel more strongly about it at the moment then we will later in the day or week that follows. Therefore, collecting that data earlier means it will be more relevant or accurate for how the experience makes one feel.
So, Why Is The Feedback Different?
The reasons we discussed above might cause the difference in feedback our listener receives. However, it is also important to remember that both sets are valuable. If you are getting complaints anywhere, they are worth listening to; if they are different over time, there is value in that, too. Perhaps you need to incorporate both into your customer feedback.
Also, it could be that the customer’s view changes. For example, when I watch my favorite football team, Luton Town, at a match, I might think they played very well. But then, after I discussed the game with my children, who pointed out that they only took two shots at the goal, I think my kids made a good point. Then, I hear the match coverage that echoes the sentiment that the team could have played better than they did, further cementing the idea that they didn’t play well. By the time a day or so passes, I might have changed my view of their playing from “very well” to “just okay” or even to “pretty poorly.”
If there were a survey for the football team, they would end up with positive feedback from me immediately after and then negative feedback later. Lucky for them, nobody cares what I think about their playing.
However, it is important to consider if the problem with the feedback isn’t the experience, but the way the company requests input. Is the problem in the phrasing of the questions or the type of questions?
Plus, who is asking the questions? When I was in corporate, we used to have an annual customer satisfaction survey for the largest corporate telecoms accounts. Salespeople did the survey.
However, the interesting bit was that the survey results contributed to the salespeople’s bonus. I bet you can imagine how those scores looked.
The salesperson story is an example of sampling bias. Choosing who in an organization gets to fill out the satisfaction survey is a form of sampling bias.
Sampling bias is also when you don’t get feedback from all your customers but only a few. For example, your survey might go to everyone, but only those who had a great experience and a really bad one will respond. So, everyone who said their experience was great or fine at the time probably didn’t respond to the survey unless they fell into one of these camps.
If questions on the follow-up survey differ from those you ask in person, it can affect the responses, even if the questions are the same. If somebody comes to my table and asks how my meal is, I might respond to that in terms of how it tastes. How does the food taste? The food tastes great.
However, when filling out a survey about the dining experience later, I might include other areas besides the taste of the food. I might include that the parking or the wait was a hassle. Maybe the table where I was sitting was drafty or had a wobble. All these things can contribute to that overall experience. However, the food was great. So, in this case, I was consistent in my evaluations; my varying response was to different parts of the experience in the subsequent survey.
One of the most significant considerations is determining what you want to measure. If you aren’t sure, decide what’s driving value for customers. It could be the food, but it also could be the convenience or speed from ordering to eating. The value could also be the live music you feature or the ambiance of your dining room. Whatever the value is, that’s where you want to direct your queries for feedback.
So, What Should You Do With This?
Our listener has a few things he can do to reconcile these mismatching feedback streams. First, consider that any feedback is a gift, no matter when it comes. If a person offers suggestions or complains that something you are doing isn’t working, you need to be grateful for it, even if it comes after a stream of positive feedback and you didn’t expect it.
However, regarding his actual question about why customers tell him one thing in person and another later, he should consider whether he is asking the same question at each survey point. How you phrase and what you ask will affect the responses.
Also, remember the constrictions around in-person feedback. Some people might want to avoid conflict or embarrassment, so they avoid giving real feedback. Anonymity in a survey later might bring out the honesty in some folks.
Additionally, if the experience was good, customers who gave positive feedback in person might not take the time to complete official surveys later. Most surveys later come from the extremes, meaning they come from customers who either loved or hated it. The customers who thought it was good, fine, or “as I expected” probably won’t bother filling out a survey later.
Another key thing for me is to ask about what drives value. It is essential to get customer feedback about your various attempts to enhance the value and find out if it is working.
Also, based on my salesperson story, where the salespeople were completing the surveys about themselves (and securing their bonuses), have an independent party survey customers. It removes all the conflict of interest if the feedback is from an uninvolved third party. Plus, no one has to worry about upsetting their point of contact at the company by offering them a bad review that keeps them from making their bonus.
So, with all that said, what did you think of the newsletter? I’d love to hear your feedback in the comments below. And my bonus has nothing to do with your answers, so feel free to let it rip.
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