Diving into the Customer Service Satisfaction Survey to Improve All Customer Service Sessions

Diving into the Customer Service Satisfaction Survey to Improve All Customer Service Sessions

 

 

 

 

 

The customer service satisfaction survey is the chief tool to use to assure you offer the best customer service sessions. Your customers are bound to elicit customer service activities with your business, no matter how well they know your products.

Whether it’s for technical support, a glitch in a product or help with your digital properties, seeking out and receiving customer service is a major part of your customer experience. It can occur in all parts of the customer buying journey, including pre-sales and post-sales periods.

As such, you’ll need to optimize your customer service satisfaction, just as you would with any other part of your CX. This is also because customers don’t keep their brand perception to themselves.   

72% of customers will share a positive customer service experience with 6 or more people. However, unsatisfied customers also share their experiences; 13% of unhappy customers will share their experiences with 15 people or more.

To take matters into further perspective, 70% of customers say they’ll support a company that delivers great customer service. 17% of Americans are even willing to pay more for a business that has a good reputation regarding its customer service. 

These statics prove the weight that customer service satisfaction has on businesses. You can optimize yours by gauging this experience through surveys.  

This article explains the customer service satisfaction survey, its importance, when to use it and how to create one. 

Understanding the Customer Service Satisfaction Survey

The customer service satisfaction survey is a survey that inquires into customer service satisfaction, as its name suggests. It is a kind of customer service survey, but it should not be mistaken for one, as there are a few distinctions between the two.

The customer service survey is a broader survey type that can be used across the customer buying journey, whereas the customer service satisfaction survey specifically focuses on the satisfaction portion of a customer service session. In this regard, this survey zeros in on support sessions, which are typically conducted after a customer has already made a purchase. 

However, this is not a fast and hard rule, as there are other instances in a customer journey where customers receive customer service. Businesses will need to probe them on their satisfaction with these experiences as well. 

As such, this kind of survey is centered on gathering customer feedback on the satisfaction aspect of various kinds of customer service. Businesses can use it to measure customer happiness and dissatisfaction during the service session, learn how to improve their service and discover how to streamline future customer service sessions. 

When it comes to differentiating from other customer satisfaction surveys, the customer service satisfaction survey entails using customer service representatives to help come up with the questions. This is because you’ll need to use questions specific to the customer service session; otherwise, your customers won’t want to take part in the survey, as it will come across as too generic and not useful to their situation. 

The Importance of the Customer Service Satisfaction Survey

The customer service satisfaction survey is critical to use for a number of reasons, including the ones mentioned in the intro.

To piggyback off of the intro, the importance of this survey comes into play, given that you can use it to improve your overall customer experience. Given that customer service sessions involve interacting with a company, usually for an extended period, it plays a major role in CX.

In fact, 1 in 3 customers will leave a business they love after only one bad experience, while 92% would completely abandon a company after two or three negative interactions. There are many things that contribute to a bad customer service experience — some aren’t as obvious as others. 

This is where the customer service satisfaction survey is useful, as it helps you find the things that bother your customers, ones which you may have overlooked or never had considered as sources of problems.

A poor customer service experience can be due to the lack of a follow-up. In this case, businesses that have time-poor employees are at a disadvantage, unless they commit to following up with the customers they’ve assisted in a customer service session.

However, even if you follow up with customers you’ve assisted, the customers themselves may lack the time and will to speak with you, if it’s over the phone. Emailing customers is the easy route; however, they may be unwilling to begin an email conversation with customer service agents. 

importance of thte customer service satisfaction survey

In such a case, the customer service satisfaction survey is especially useful, as it provides a quick and easy method to follow up with your customers after a customer service session. You’ll show your customers you care about their opinions on their customer service experience without asking them for too much time while reaping the benefits of their insights.

As such, this survey helps build connections between you and your customers. The stronger your connection with customers, the more they’ll rely on your products and services. As such, this survey can be used as a tool that goes beyond merely learning about how satisfied customers were with the customer service they got. It also doesn’t stop at improving your CX. Instead, by building relationships with customers, you’re also building brand trust, the cornerstone of consumer loyalty.  

Loyal customers are far more inclined on making repeat purchases than causal customers. These are the most quality customers you can strive for, as they will continuously purchase from your brand and even become brand advocates. Loyal customers also tend to have a higher Customer Lifetime Value (CLV). 

Given that this survey can help foster brand loyalty and a high CLV, it will in turn lower customer attrition along with your customer churn rate, as you are retaining your customers.

All brands should use the customer service satisfaction survey, as it can reveal critical insights on how to improve your customer service. 

When to Use the Customer Service Satisfaction Survey

You’ve probably had various kinds of customer service sessions with your customers. Sometimes, what may appear to be a regular in-store or online encounter, such as a chat, turns out to be something more significant, as it involves customers interacting with your support or sales employees for a considerable amount of time. 

Or, it may be quick, but provided invaluable help for your customers. These qualify as customer service sessions as well.

This begs the question of when is the best time to send a customer service satisfaction survey.

The following lists the most apt times to send a customer service satisfaction survey:

  1. After any situation in which a customer received assistance from an employee, whether it is a customer service employee or others.
    1. This can involve solicited help, in which customers set up a call or at-home meeting with a representative, or when your employees approach the customers.
  2. Directly after a scheduled meeting, phone call or other customer service session.
    1. It is best to let the customers know that you intend to survey them by emailing them.
    2. This is also a good time to collect their email addresses if you haven’t already.
    3. This usually occurs after a customer has purchased from you.  
  3. After a customer sampled your product at a store and spoke with a sales representative.
    1. This occurs usually before a customer has made a purchase and is still deliberating whether to buy from you or a competitor.
    2. This is a good opportunity to understand customer satisfaction with your customer service in the early stages of your customers’ relationship with you.
  4. After an impromptu customer service chatting session.
    1. Some chatting sessions can be minor, with customers asking basic questions that can be found elsewhere on your website.
    2. But others are more significant, granting key information to customers about all your offerings.
    3. This can occur at various places in the customer journey, from pre-sales, to after a recent purchase and well after purchasing. 
  5. After customers interacted with a Voice of the Customer (VoC) program, such as a phone call, or in-person experience. 
    1. At times, your support employees may offer specific customer service during these times, so these sessions can extend beyond customers’ venting about their issues or other feedback. 
    2. You can frame the survey as being sent to better help the customers further, even after they gave their VoC feedback.

How to Create a Customer Service Satisfaction Survey

There are various instances where you’ll need to use a customer service satisfaction survey, as the above section explains. They will help you gauge how satisfied your customers are at different points of being served. 

If you’re not sure how to go about creating this survey and need a few pointers, the following will guide you.

The following explains how to create a customer service satisfaction survey in a step-by-step way. Check out how to create customer service survey questions.

how to create a customer service satisfaction survey

  1. Determine a recent instance with a customer, in which they received customer service. 
    1. Refer to the above section to help you decide what to accomplish with your customer service satisfaction survey.
  2. Decide on the correct online survey platform.
    1. There is a swath of online survey tools but they don’t all offer the same capabilities, user-friendliness and speed to insights as does Pollfish.
  3. In the screener section of the survey, select the demographics, location and other traits with which you're going to qualify the respondents of the survey.
    1. Use screening questions to select respondents even more granularly, by qualifying only those who answer in a particular way to take the survey.
  4. Form a few key preliminary questions for the questionnaire portion and guide the direction of your survey.
    1. These should be based on the nature of the customer service.
  5. Choose the survey type you need for your campaign.
  6. In the questionnaire section, add in your preliminary questions. Choose from a multitude of types of survey questions. 
    1. Create both general questions and those that are very specific to the customer service session you had.
      1. Your customer service representative will need to come up with the questions. 
      2. As such, this kind of survey will involve more than just your analysts and market researchers, as it will require forming specific questions from sessions with your customer support team.
    2. Use advanced skip logic to route respondents to relevant follow-up questions based on their answers. 
      1. With skip logic, you can ask a quantitative question using multiple choice and follow-up with a qualitative, open-ended question.
  7. Always make the survey unique to your brand if you send it to specific people instead of mass-sending it as in Step A.
  8. Write an effective email invitation by mentioning the importance of the survey and the fact that you value your customers’ time.
    1. You can include survey incentives.
  9. Include a call to action (CTA) to an online survey, such as one that exists on a landing page, or post-checkout. 
    1. Be sure it stands out to your respondents. 
  10. Thank your customers for taking your survey with follow-up emails and a “Thank You” on the final page of your online survey.
  11. Analyze your survey and use it to make changes to improve your customer service satisfaction.
    1. This may include changing your customer service representatives’ tone of voice, their introduction statements to the customers, etc.
    2. This may also lead you to omit certain things your customer service representatives currently use when assisting your customers. 

Forging the Most Satisfying Customer Service Meetings

There are various key aspects that makeup of customer experience; customer service sessions are one of the most important factors, as these meetings allow customers to resolve issues, ask key questions about your products and services, acquaint themselves with your offerings and virtually anything else related to customer service. 

You’ll need a strong market research platform to host your customer service satisfaction survey campaigns. The platform you use should also allow you to survey anyone.  As such, you’ll need a platform with a reach to millions of consumers, along with one that offers the Distribution Link feature. 

This feature will allow you to send your survey to specific customers, instead of only deploying them across a vast network. 

It is also important to use a mobile-first platform, as mobile dominates the digital space and no one wants to take surveys in a shoddy mobile environment.  

The online survey platform you opt for should also offer artificial intelligence and machine learning to remove low-quality data, offer a broad range of survey and question types and disqualify low-quality data. 

With an online survey platform with all of these capabilities, you’ll be able to measure and improve your customer service satisfaction survey.

by lorraine

customer service survey

Diving Into the Customer Service Survey to Meet All Customer Service Demands

Diving Into the Customer Service Survey to Meet All Customer Service Demands

customer service survey

All businesses must conduct a customer service survey from time to time to ensure their consumers are satisfied with their service and all of its associations. 

This is because few other things contribute to the success of your business as much as your customer service. 

In fact, 90% of Americans use customer service as a factor to decide whether or not to do business with a company. As such, for the vast majority of American consumers, customer service is a make-or-break aspect that can mean patronizing your company or going to your competitor. 

Customers have high expectations when it comes to customer service, as they expect to receive customer service from any channel and device. However, 60% of customers don’t see customer service as becoming easier, as 86% of customers have had to contact customer service multiple times for the same reason. 

This signifies that brands don’t take care of customer needs, even when they are told upfront through a Voice of Customer (VoC) program.

This article delves into the customer service survey, its importance, when to use it, how to create one and more. 

Understanding the Customer Service Survey

As its name suggests, the customer service survey is a kind of consumer survey that deals with the specific matters, concerns, interests, considerations and other feedback that customers have in regards to the customer service of your organization.

Dealing specifically with the customer service aspect of their customer buying journey, this survey provides your customers with an avenue to express their opinions on all things relating to your customer service.

Customer service refers to the support you offer your customers both before and after they buy and use your products or services. Providing customer service ensures that your customers have an easy and enjoyable customer experience with you. 

This is of utmost importance because CX is a combination of all the opinions and experiences customers have and associate with your brand. It can mean the difference between them casting aspersions on your brand, thus going to competitors, or enjoying it, raising their consumer loyalty and Customer Lifetime Value.  

To improve your customer service and your overall customer experience, you should use the customer experience survey, as it provides various means for understanding your customer service.

As such, the following lists all the functions and abilities that this kind of customer survey provides for your business:

  1. To rate your customers’ satisfaction with your customer service 
  2. To explain their grievances
  3. To file complaints  
  4. To express what they liked
  5. To give suggestions for improvement and more
  6. To give insight into their consumer preferences as they relate to your service
  7. To relay their chosen mode of providing feedback
  8. To discover gaps in the service
  9. To help customers achieve a certain goal
  10. To understand your customers’ own questions about your service

The Importance of Customer Service Survey

The customer service survey is important for a variety of reasons, all of which contribute to the success of your business, whether it is with a particular customer segment, for a certain campaign or otherwise.

Firstly, offering good customer service is an important factor for retaining customers and customer retention is more cost-effective than customer retention. This is because it costs five times more to acquire a new customer than it does to keep an existing one. 

Additionally, the success rate of selling to current customers is 60-70%, while only 5-10% when selling to new customers. When you deliver consistently good customer service, you’ll be able to build consumer loyalty and retain customers. The longer you keep your customers, the longer you’ll benefit from customer retention. 

customer service survey

Moreover, in today’s competitive marketplace, customer service involves far more than merely a telephone support agent. Customers get support via various channels, such as email, chat, text message, social media, in-person and more. 

It is imperative that brands adapt to these customer service methods. In doing so, they’ll need to understand exactly what bothers and satisfies their customers as they receive this service in an omnichannel setting. 

This kind of survey is also important to use in self-service scenarios, as many companies provide self-service support for their customers. This method allows customers to access customer support at any time convenient to them, rather than only during business hours. 

The customer service survey is also useful, as it provides flexibility. It is apt to send this survey before, during and after a customer receives some sort of customer service. Doing so will grant you complete insight into what customers are experiencing and how they perceive all the customer service your employees provide.

While you may consider your employees to be well-trained and adept at providing customer service, your customers may think otherwise, at least at certain points. Thus, the customer service survey provides you with a clear view of customers’ experience with your customer service when you aren’t there to see or hear it — which is impossible to do all the time, even if your company is small.

Lastly, the customer service survey is a critical tool for improving your brand image and reputation. As such, it can help you augment your brand equity, which is the value your business derives from being recognizable. Most importantly, by surveying customers on their customer service, you’re showing them you care and are open to making adjustments to best serve them.

Utilamely, the customer service survey allows you to carry out these improvements, enabling you to increase your brand trust. This is a crucial concept to maintain for your brand, as high levels of trust spur customer retention and interest in your brand, thereby fostering customer acquisition as well. 

When you lure new customers with minimal effort, you’ll also be lowering your customer acquisition cost.  

When to Use a Customer Service Survey

As mentioned above, you can deploy a customer service survey at various times, not just after customers received customer service. 

In fact, when you distribute surveys before your customers receive any customer support, you’ll know their expectations beforehand, arming you with the knowledge of how to serve them during any support session. 

The following provides examples of when you should use the customer service survey:

  1. After your customers bought from you, whether it is in-store or digitally.
    1. In this example, you inquire into whether or not they asked or received any help from your employees.
    2. This will let you know whether your employees asked customers if they need help or if they hadn’t, what stopped the customers from asking for help themselves. 
  2. Before your customers head into your store.
    1. Whether they chat with your company on the phone or via a chat, make sure to send them a survey prior to their arrival at your store. 
    2. Simply ask them first and then send them the link to your survey. 
    3. This also applies if they received customer service before continuing their online customer journey.
  3. As your customers are speaking with you.
    1. You can preface your customer service session by mentioning the survey and asking for their consent. 
    2. You can also mention survey incentives if you offer them to raise your survey completion rates. 
  4. When you scheduled a support session, but customers missed it or opted out.
    1. Send a survey to understand why they missed the scheduled customer service session.
    2. If the customers opted out beforehand, send a survey to find out why and what would have made them keep their appointment.
  5. After a customer complains and before they receive customer service to help resolve their issue. 
    1. This involves times of dissatisfaction, whether it’s with a product, service or experience.
    2. Send the survey after the customers complain, but before you serve them with follow-up service.
    3. This way, you’ll know the issue and how to go about providing the best customer service to resolve it.

How to Create a Customer Service Survey

There are many approaches you can take with your customer service survey, as laid out above. If you’re still not sure how to go about creating one or need a few pointers, the following will help you.

The following steps guide you on how to create a customer service survey. Check out how to create customer service survey questions.

how to create a customer service survey

  1. Define the goal of your survey.
    1. Refer to the above section to help you decide what to accomplish with your customer service survey.
  2. Decide on the correct online survey platform.
    1. There are a host of online survey tools but they don’t all offer the same capabilities and speed to insights as does Pollfish.
  3. In the screener section of the survey, select the demographics, location and other traits with which you're going to qualify who gets to take the survey.
    1. Use screening questions to select respondents even more granularly, as only those who answer in the way you choose will take the survey.
  4. Come up with a few key preliminary questions for the questionnaire portion and guide the direction of your survey.
  5. Choose the survey type you need for your campaign.
  6. In the questionnaire section, add in your preliminary questions. Choose from a multitude of types of survey questions. 
    1. Use advanced skip logic to route respondents to relevant follow-up questions based on their answers. 
    2. With skip logic, you can ask a quantitative question using multiple choice and follow-up with a qualitative, open-ended question.
  7. Decide who to send your survey to. This may at times include a broad study with all customers on a mailing list or specific customers who will receive or already experienced a customer service interaction.
    1. If you’re deploying your survey to a mass network via your online survey platform, decide whether to use your brand name logo and other indicators.
    2. Always make the survey unique to your brand if you send it to specific people instead of mass-sending it as in Step A.
  8. Write an effective email invitation if you’re sending your survey to specific customers via email.
    1. Mention the importance of the survey and that you value your customers’ time.
    2. You can include incentives.
  9. Include a call to action (CTA) to an online survey, such as one that exists on a landing page, or post-checkout. 
    1. Be sure it stands out to your respondents. 
  10. Thank your customers for taking your survey with follow-up emails and a “Thank You” on the final page of your online survey.
  11. Analyze your survey and use it to make changes and key customer service decisions.

Satisfying All Your Customers

Brands should always work towards delighting their customers with amazing customer service. Your customer service is a reflection of how your company treats its customers. No matter the values associated with your brand, if you provide poor customer service, customers will always go elsewhere.

To create an insightful customer service survey study, opt for the proper online survey platform. 

Such a platform should run on random device engagement (RDE) sampling, enabling you to reach customers in their natural digital environments, instead of being pre-recruited. This removes social pressures and will cut back on biases.

You should also use a mobile-first platform since mobile dominates the digital space.  

Most importantly, the survey platform should allow you to survey anyone.  As such, you’ll need a platform with a reach to millions of consumers, along with one that offers the Distribution Link feature. 

This feature will allow you to send your survey to specific customers, instead of just deploying them across a network. 

When you use an online survey platform with all of these capabilities, you’ll be able to collect key customer service data and outperform on future customer service endeavors. 

by lorraine