Measuring Up: There is No One Ruler in Gauging Customer Satisfaction

In businesses that are constantly trying to attract and keep a faithful clientele measuring customer satisfaction has become a barometer for success. Understanding a customer’s experience in a store—whether it is a service station, food market, clothing store, or bookseller– in relation to satisfaction with the product, store, workers, and other elements, can be assessed via various tools. The common triumvirate of customer satisfaction indicators is composed of mystery shoppers, Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and Web surveys, and customer focus groups. Alone each of these tools offers a unique perspective on customer satisfaction. Taken and analyzed together they create a total picture of the customer experience.

Although some retailers may have an affinity for the survey over the mystery shopper or the IVR over the focus group, the fact is calculating customer satisfaction employing only one of these devices is like measuring a hurricane by just using radar. Important information can be garnered from Doppler radar, but tracking wind speed, rainfall amounts and their effects and flooding and destruction from rising rivers, streams, and crushing tides gives you a total picture of the storm and its consequences.

Just as the effect of a hurricane may be measured using various methods, so too can the effectiveness of customer service in a consumer-connected business be analyzed. For this reason it’s not only a good idea to use an array of measuring devices for success it is essential. Mystery shoppers, IVR/Web surveys, and focus groups all gauge the efficacy of your business in relationship to your customers, but each of these instruments provides its own set of revelations.

Mystery shoppers are professionals who enter an establishment in order to test the manner in which you run your business. They rate various aspects of your store, including physical attractiveness, inventory accessibility, and store layout. Aspects of customer service that employees are graded on are product knowledge, friendliness, and helpfulness. Most companies that use mystery shoppers keep the 15 to 20 questions used to rate a store consistent over an extended period of time. This uniformity helps the company’s leaders recognize trends, positive changes, and continuing challenges.

Although the IVR and Web survey use different media, they are similar in content and objectives. If a customer is asked to call a voice center or log onto a Web site, they’ll encounter numerous multiple-choice questions about their retail experience. Usually a customer receives some sort of premium for taking the time to rate the retailer. They may be given a coupon to use towards a future purchase or entered into a sweepstakes. Customers are chosen at random when paying for merchandise and usually have a window of time in which to take the survey.

The major difference between IVR/Web surveys and mystery shoppers is that the former are composed of people who have made a choice to seek out the retailer’s services and products, while the mystery shopper is a professional evaluator possessing specific criteria by which they rate the establishment. The IVR/Web surveys offer a large sampling that may be more indicative of a customer’s basic experiences, feelings, and conclusions, but the mystery shopper is able to create a more intricate analysis focusing on the systemic relationship between management, customer service, merchandising, and other facets.

The third type of grading instrument is the focus group. Focus groups successfully combine elements of mystery shopping with the IVR/Web survey. Like those taking a survey, focus group participants are consumers who have availed themselves of a store’s services; like the mystery shopper, they can be more critical. This is due to the fact that group discussions tend to develop ideas and yield more details than a survey. Additionally, the group discussions are led by a professional who, like the mystery shopper, has a particular agenda, This panel of customers is a sampling that can offer more specifics than the larger group of survey-based evaluators.

If businesses choose each of these unique testing tools, they have a better chance of developing a more detailed picture of the strengths and weaknesses of their enterprise. Focus groups create an opportunity for retailers to delve into detailed discussions with customers. Mystery shopping provides specific insights and expert analysis devoted to establishing, maintaining, and improving professional standards. IVR/Web surveys have the power to give an accurate but generalized sketch from customer related questions. The bottom line is this total approach to measuring and assessing every part of your retail machine is about improving your bottom line.