5 easy ways to make the most of customer feedback in 2024

Customers just want to know that the brands they support care about them and their experiences. There’s nothing that wins over an unhappy customer like seeing changes being made based on the feedback they gave on a simple customer survey. 

When this happens, a formerly dissatisfied customer feels a positive emotional bond with the brand and can become one of their most loyal customers. Who doesn’t want to be the person who helps make things better for themselves and other customers? 

Unhappy customers will be more patient and appreciate the fact that your company puts in the effort to create a better customer experience. Most people aren’t expecting perfection, but they’ll begin to trust and root for a company that constantly improves. 

Customer feedback provides valuable insights into the strengths and weaknesses of your customer journey. By understanding how your clients perceive their experiences with your brand, you can identify pain points and areas for improvement. This enables you to create a seamless customer experience and manage customer satisfaction with professional knowledge. 

After reading this article, you’ll understand why customer feedback is important and have five simple yet effective ways to gather customer feedback and increase customer retention. By implementing these strategies, you can easily improve customer satisfaction, enhance your product or service, and increase customer loyalty to your brand.

1. Establish clear objectives.

The first step to making the most of customer feedback is to establish clear objectives that align with your primary business goals. What do you want to achieve with the information your customers have given you?

Defining your primary business goal will help you know what kind of feedback you should be gathering and how to use it. Objectives are essential because they guide the feedback collection process and help you measure the success of your feedback program.

Your objectives should be SMART by being specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. For example, an objective could be to increase your customer satisfaction score by 10% within the next six months.

This objective is smart because it provides a clear goal for the feedback collection process and helps you measure the success of your efforts. By establishing clear objectives, you provide a framework for collecting customer feedback and using it purposefully.

Simpu's customer experience software makes this process easier by allowing you to define specific targets, which can be to improve customer satisfaction scores, enhance product or service features, or improve customer service processes.

2. Collect customer feedback in one central place.

Selecting the most appropriate channels to collect feedback from your customers is key. This includes online customer surveys, in-app surveys, feedback forms on your website, social media listening, customer reviews, or even direct feedback such as focus groups or customer interviews. 

Collecting the necessary feedback will help you understand your target audience better and also help you determine which channels are most effective in reaching and engaging them. You can then focus on leveraging these channels to convert more customers.

Asides from just gathering customer feedback from your customers that are located on different platforms, and communities - you want to keep the data in one centralized location. 

According to a Global Data Insights Survey, carried out by Digital Realty, Over 44% of companies with $1B+ revenues now keep data centralized. These businesses have cited faster processing, reduced budgets for processing, and proximity of data to users and devices. 

Storing customer data in a centralized location helps save time, eliminate data silos, and facilitate collaboration across teams. Additionally, gathering feedback on one platform makes it easy to track trends, identify recurring issues, and uncover opportunities for improvement.

Encourage all ongoing customer feedback to maintain a continuous improvement cycle. Regularly solicit customer opinions and monitor customer satisfaction metrics, such as Net Promoter Score (NPS). 

This allows you to stay connected with your customers' evolving needs and make necessary adjustments to your offerings. 

3. Actively listen and analyze.

It’s not enough to idly gather feedback and not do anything with it. Actively listening to customer feedback and analyzing it thoroughly helps unlock valuable customer insights, that can greatly improve your business's performance.

Carefully listen to the feedback you receive and analyze it systematically. Look for common themes, patterns, and trends. Categorize feedback into different areas such as product features, customer service, pricing, or user experience.

Utilize sentiment analysis tools or manual evaluation to gauge the overall sentiment associated with the feedback. Monitoring sentiment analysis allows you to quickly address negative feedback, mitigate potential crises, and proactively improve your customer experience.

For example, software companies that use Simpu for analyzing feedback can discover a recurring request for a specific feature.

Userpilot suggests that complaints like bug issues are insightful data software companies can use to improve their products. 

Armed with this insight, it's easy to prioritize feature development that aligns with customer expectations and enhances overall customer satisfaction.

4. Implement changes and communicate.

Use the information gained from customer insights to drive meaningful changes in your business. Prioritize areas that require improvement based on the feedback analysis.

Customer feedback is only valuable if you act on it. Whether it's improving a product feature or refining your customer service process, leverage feedback to drive meaningful improvements.

Respond to customer queries, complaints, and suggestions promptly to demonstrate your commitment to customer satisfaction. Acknowledge their concerns, provide solutions, and keep them informed of any changes or improvements made.

After implementing changes, communicate the updates to your customers to show them that their feedback has been heard and acted upon. 

Clearly highlight the improvements made based on their feedback and explain how these changes benefit them. This will help to build trust and increase customer loyalty.

Communicate with other customers, including new customers and potential customers, about the improvements being made. It shows that you care about your customers and are committed to improving your business’ performance.

Consider investing in customer feedback management software and get the right training for your support team to better meet customer needs.

5. Share customer feedback.

Sharing customer feedback, both positive and negative, can significantly impact your brand's reputation and influence potential customers.

You can highlight positive testimonials and reviews from satisfied customers and use them as social proof. Feature customer success stories to help you gain valuable brand ambassadors. It will attract new customers and strengthen customer loyalty. When handled effectively, addressing negative feedback can turn dissatisfied customers into loyal advocates. 

Share negative feedback to demonstrate transparency and a commitment to continuous improvement. It is an excellent way to show your customers that you value their opinions and patronage.

By featuring real customer experiences, you can gain the trust of potential customers and encourage them to choose your brand.

Depending on where you’re sharing the feedback, you can simply retweet on Twitter or create branded testimonials for your website and other social media platforms. 

You can also create short video testimonials which can be used for marketing on your Stories, Reels, TikTok videos, and YouTube Shorts. 

How to collect customer feedback on Simpu.

Simpu's customer feedback feature enables you to measure customer satisfaction easily and effectively. This is an important part of running a profitable and customer-focused business because it allows you to proactively enhance your product or service.

The CSAT feature lets customers score their experience on a five-star scale, and the rating will be reflected in your conversation analytics. You can use this to evaluate how your customers feel about their support experience effectively and make informed decisions to improve your service.

Collecting feedback on your desired channels on Simpu.

All communication channels on Simpu support CSAT, including WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, Webchat, Gmail, Microsoft Outlook, and other email clients.

To turn on the CSAT feedback request feature for your desired channels, follow these steps:

1. On your dashboard, click on the “Settings” icon ⚙️
2. Click on “inboxes”
3. Open the inbox and select your desired channel
4. Click the “edit” icon on the right of the channel you’ve chosen.
5. Toggle on "Allow CSAT rating"
6. Click on “Update” to save your settings.

Viewing your customer feedback.

To view your conversation rating, follow these steps:

1. On your inbox dashboard, click on the Analytics icon 📊
2. Click on “Customer Satisfaction”.
3. Click on a designated teammate's name to view the rating distribution, ratings, and CSAT comments they’ve received.
4. Click the eye icon beside ratings to view conversation ratings.

To conclude, investing in a customer feedback tool is an invaluable resource that can drive business success when used effectively. Gathering customer feedback is very important for your business strategy, It shows you the areas that need improvement to empower you to achieve customer satisfaction, enhance loyalty, and gain a competitive edge. 

You can now use the power of your customer's voice to drive business performance and exceed customer expectations like Piggyvest does.

Gather insights from your customers firsthand with our 14-day free trial, allowing you to listen to their valuable feedback on their interaction with your business.