4. CE
Measures of
customer
satisfaction
• Overall customer satisfaction with the organization and its products /
services
• Rating in the industry on the basis of overall customer satisfaction
• Satisfaction with value for money
• Desire to recommend the product or service to others.
• Loyalty in terms of repeat purchases
5. CE
Means of measuring
customer satisfaction
I.Customer feedback after delivery of product or service
II.Customer complaints and suggestions
III. Customer Surveys
6. CE
I. Customer feedback after delivery of product or
service
This is one of the simplest, fastest and the most effective method of
measuring customer satisfaction. The customers should be immediately
asked to evaluate the product or service and comment upon areas of
satisfaction and dissatisfaction.
7. CE
II. Customer complaints
and suggestions
The organization must have a formalized system of recording all
customer complaints and as well as the methods of their disposal.
Customer complaints must be taken very positively as valuable inputs
by the organization and should immediately trigger the improvement
activities.
8. CE
IV. Customer
surveys
Steps in conducting customer surveys : -
A. Identify your customers requirements under various segments.
B. Determine your survey methodology
C. Develop survey / interview questions
D. Conduct survey / Interview your customers
9. CE
A. Identify your
customers requirement
areas.
It is extremely important to know the requirement of your
customers before designing a questionnaire or survey. This is
because if we do not ask the right questions, the answers we get
will be irrelevant and it will be difficult to find out if the customers
are really satisfied with the issues that are important to them.
10. CE
Ways to identify customer
requirements
• Discuss the issue with sample group of customers
• Ask your existing customers “If we have to develop a questionnaire to
measure our customers’ satisfaction, what questions should we ask.
• Brainstorming with employees from various functions within the
organization. A cross section of ideas from various people will give us
the complete picture about the requirement of the customers
11. CE
Product requirements
For identifying the customer requirements for a
PRODUCT, the survey must cover the following
areas:
• Performance
• Timeliness
• Reliability
• Durability
• Serviceability
• Aesthetics
12. CE
Service requirements
For identifying the customer
requirements for a SERVICE, the
survey must cover the following areas:
• Security
• Reliability
• Accessibility
• Timeliness
• Responsiveness
• Empathy
• Assurance
13. CE
B. Determine your survey methodology
This requires the organization to answer the following questions :
• How many customers to survey?
• Whom to survey?
• How to survey?
• When to survey?
• Who should conduct the survey?
14. CE
How many customers to survey
The basic rule behind sample selection is to choose a cross section
of customers which represents your overall customer base. For
example if your customer database consists of large, medium &
small organizations, your sample must represent the same.
Other criteria for selecting may include percentage of frequent
versus infrequent customers, industry sector & geographic area.
15. CE
Whom to survey?
While conducting the survey, the organizations must include the
following customers:
• Present customers
• Potential customers
• Past customers
• Competitor’s customers
16. CE
Whom to survey?
The customer sample must never be biased. Everyone wants to
hear good things from the customers and nobody wants to hear a
negative feedback. There is a natural tendency to include a
positive feedback and to exclude the negative feedback. This will
never reflect the true measure of customer satisfaction. The
organization must be willing to hear both positive & the negative
from the customers if they are truly willing to improve their
customer satisfaction.
17. CE
How to survey?
The following methods can be used for conducting the survey:
• Mail survey
• Telephonic surveys
• Face to face interviews
• Comment cards
The best method will depend on your situation, number of
customers in the sample group and what works best for your
customers.
18. CE
When to survey?
Survey at periodic intervals:
Many organizations prefer to conduct customer satisfaction
measurement survey at certain time of the year. This however
has certain disadvantages. If the period of survey is widely
known it can signal the time for enhanced services to the
customers during that period. The marketing personnel may
distribute questionnaires to customers during these periods.
Such conduct is open to all sorts of bias & this practice should
be discouraged and avoided.
19. CE
When to survey?
Surveying continuously:
More & more organizations are moving towards continuous
measurement of customer satisfaction due to turbulent & dynamic
marketing environment. Continuous measurement recognizes the
on-going importance of customer satisfaction and is not influenced
by momentary events (good or bad). This method keeps the
organization completely focused on customer satisfaction & does
not allow it to be forgotten between survey waves.
20. CE
When to survey?
Surveying after “moments of truth” :
Moments of truth are any interactions with customers in which
an organizations effectiveness is tested. For example
• Getting the car loan from the bank
• Settlement of insurance claims
• Similarly, receiving money from the cash counter of a bank
21. CE
When to survey?
Every moment of truth can be followed up with a satisfaction
survey to determine as to how well the organization has
performed in this important interaction.
22. CE
Who should conduct the survey?
The survey can be undertaken by the organizations
themselves or it can also be given to outside agencies.
There are following advantages of getting the survey by
outside professional agencies.
23. CE
Who should conduct the survey?
• They are more objective in formulating questions & analyzing
responses.
• Customers are more open when providing information to third
parties.
• Professional agencies have the expertise to ensure that the
process is productive & effective.
24. CE
C. Develop survey questions
The organization must develop a pre-determined set
of questions which must take into account all the
requirements of the customers.
25. CE
Develop survey questions
The questionnaire must give an impression to the customers
that you are thorough & organized when gathering customer
satisfaction information. The presentation & packaging of the
questionnaire should not be shoddy. A good appearance can
suggest evidence of organization’s high commitment to
customer satisfaction management process and vice versa.
26. CE
Sample questionnaire - Airlines
A. At the airport Excellent Good Average
Waiting time for getting the boarding pass
Behavior of the front desk executive
Ready availability of information
Time taken in identification of luggage
27. CE
Sample questionnaire - Airlines
B. In-flight service Excellent Good Average
Cabin crew’s welcome at the
time of boarding the flight
Availability of reading material
Quality and quantity of food &
beverages
Quality of service
Space in the aircraft to keep
your hand baggage
Responsiveness for special
service asked for
Cleanliness in the toilets
28. CE
Sample questionnaire - Airlines
C. In-flight experience Excellent Good Average
Timeliness of the flight
In flight experience with regard to:-
Noise level
Temperature
Ride and landing
Flight ambience
Overall ratings
Your suggestions for improvement
29. CE
Customer feedback
Sample survey / feedback forms for consumer durables, consumer
non-durables and service industry are given in MS Excel file
“Feedback forms” given along with this package.
30. CE
Advantages of a
good survey
A well designed and executed customer satisfaction survey can
be a great asset to any organization due to the following
reasons:
• It can pinpoint expenditure & resources which is being spent but
do not help to satisfy the customers.
31. CE
Advantages of a
good survey
• It can identify opportunities for product & service innovation.
• It can ensure that the quality improvement efforts are correctly
focused on issues that are most important to a customer.
32. CE
Why customer
survey’s fail?
Unfortunately, a well designed & executed survey tends to be an
exception rather than the rule. The challenge of conducting a
customer survey is to minimize the total amount of error. This error
comes from two different sources.
A. Sampling errors
B. Measurement errors
33. CE
Types of sampling errors
These errors deal with the manner in which people are selected
in a survey. They are of following types
• Failing to use statistical sampling methods
• Incorrect selection of profile
• Incorrect selection of number of people
• Ignoring non-responses.
34. CE
Types of measurement
errors
These errors are related to the content of the survey and the
way in which the results are used. These mistakes deal with :
• Drawing incorrect inferences from the responses
• Asking non-specific questions.
• Failing to ask all the questions.
• Using incorrect or incomplete data analysis methods.
• Error in feeding the results
35. CE
Conducting surveys in consumer
& business markets
While many professionals and corporate managers seem to
understand the nature of consumer markets & surveys, many are
quite unaware of how they differ from the business markets. It is
extremely important for organizations to understand the difference
between consumer & business markets before the survey is
conducted. The differences are explained in the following slides.
36. CE
I. Size of customer population
Consumer market Business market
Most consumer markets are Many business markets are
composed of large number of composed of relatively small
customers in which no single number of customers of which few
customer has a significant share. buyers may have a substantial
share or dominant position.
37. CE
II. Magnitude of purchase volumes
Consumer market Business market
Majority of consumer A large number of business
purchases are for products and purchases are for products and
services which is relatively services that are relatively large
small in actual rupee amounts. in rupee amounts.
38. CE
III. Purchase transactions complexities
Consumer market Business market
The purchase of most The decision to purchase major
consumer items is a simple business products and services
process involving an is usually a complex process in
individual’s decision to buy or which numerous decision
not to buy. makers and influencers
negotiate terms & specifications
with suppliers.
39. CE
IV. Difference in purchase process
Consumer market Business market
Consumer products are sold In the business market, usually
through retailers, where the the products are either sold
attitude of sales staff / dealers directly or through Co’s regional
has a direct bearing on the sales offices and as such are
sales. within direct control of the
organization.
40. CE
V. Customer knowledge of supplier offerings
Consumer market Business market
As a general rule consumers Customers have considerable
are not very knowledgeable knowledge of products and
about the products & services often have means to assess the
they purchase or the suppliers quality of the products through
operational processes to pre-shipment inspection /
produce and deliver those incoming inspection.
items.
41. CE
VI. Nature of customer supplier relations
Consumer market Business market
In majority of consumer markets, The customers tend to actively
suppliers and consumers are at an develop close working relationships
arm’s length relationship in which with their key suppliers. This
the suppliers do not share relationship may involve sharing
proprietary information or seek proprietary information and joint
their collaboration in any significant efforts towards product development
way and improvement
42. CE
Assessing many Vs few customers
By comparing the structural characteristics of consumer and
business markets, it becomes clear that the bargaining balance
between suppliers and customers significantly differs. As opposed
to consumer markets, in which the suppliers sell to many
customers, business markets suppliers routinely sell on a
negotiated basis to fewer, more knowledgeable and more powerful
customers.
43. CE
Consumer market : Assessing the needs of too
many
In a consumer market, we have to assess the needs of many
customers as opposed to business markets where we have to
assess the needs of few customers. In a customer market since
every one can not be surveyed, representative samples ( say 10
to 20 % ) are drawn and quantitative techniques are used to
predict the composite perceptions of a large population.
44. CE
Business market - Assessing the needs of few
In a business market, since a handful of customers can
dominate the supplier’s sales environment, the survey has to be
conducted for a very high percentage of the total customers
( say 70 to 80 % ) and may be on a one to one basis in a few
cases.
45. CE
D. Interview your customers
Customers appreciate if asked for a feedback and have come to
expect in many industries. Whichever method is chosen to gather
the information, it must be done in a way which shows the
customers that you sincerely desire the feedback & are serious in
using their input for improving the product / service.
46. CE
Interview your customers
It is equally important to acknowledge the participation of the
customers in the survey. Once the survey is over and their valuable
inputs have been considered, they must be informed about it as well.
This has a great impact on customer loyalty and retention.
47. Disseminating the findings of your CSM
CE
The report on your customer satisfaction
management must include the following:
• Summary of findings
• Key trends
• Planned follow up measures
• Methodology of improvement plan
48. Disseminating the findings of your CSM
CE
It is also important to schedule a presentation to the top
management & top executives. In a face to face discussion, it is
far easier for the executives to ask questions & form consensus
of agreement with the results. The presentation must include an
action plan & reference tools for quality improvement as well.
