A great headline caught my attention this week "Heard Customers are Happy Customers," and I expected a deep dive into how to augment CXM programs to let customers know the brand takes Voice of the Customer feedback seriously.
Turns out that the article really promoted the author's program for how to use Voice of the Customer feedback in internal reporting. I'm sure that's an important topic, just defeated by the headline.
What I really wanted to read was any new insight beyond the "sense making" of VoC data to demonstrate to customers that we hear their feedback and use it to make changes. Most Voice of the Customer programs do a decent job of capturing data and spotting trends. Many programs even leverage that data for "sense making" and communicate it across teams and executives to help with decision making about the customer experience. Unfortunately, though, too few programs demonstrate to customers that their voices get heard.
But, all companies can improve the customer feedback cycle by incorporating one simple process, the Closed Loop exercise.
Closed Loop processes just mean that your VoC program has an immediate escalation process for low scoring surveys to a supervisor or QA team for investigation and remediation. Closed Loop processes are table stakes for a high performing VoC program, so if you don't have one or your CXM platform doesn't support closed loop escalations, get some help.
The Closed Loop process should be very simple. A closed loop activity begins when we receive a survey response with a low score, which triggers an immediate review to understand the feedback. Supervisors or Quality Assurance should take steps to identify any internal steps to address the issue or adjust processes to avoid a repeat occurrence. Then, and most importantly, the customer receives communication to know that we heard their feedback and took steps to address the issue.
In a recent escalation to our customer service center, a customer scored the experience a 1 star on our 5-star survey. Their text feedback indicated that they felt the CSR rushed through the experience and the customer wasn't sure that their order for services was accurate. Our QA team received the closed loop alert for the low score, immediately pulled the call recording to review it, and provided our supervisor with feedback about the call. QA confirmed that the CSR spoke quickly during the call, interrupted the customer twice to provide incomplete answers, and didn't understand a customer's question, resulting in an incomplete answer. We could certainly understand the customer's confusion.
Supervisors were alerted of the issue and feedback about the call and coached the agent on methods to manage call pacing and their listening skills. And, all of these steps were normal operating procedures for a customer service center, so don't require any incremental cost or time.
What makes the experience a genuine closed loop activity takes about 5 minutes of a supervisors time but yields massive improvements in CSAT and customer engagement. Our program manager sent the customer the following email:
We received your survey and feedback on your recent experience with our Customer Service center. Our Quality Team reviewed the call immediately. It's clear from the call recording that our Customer Service Representative did not understand your concerns and spoke too quickly to make sure you had a satisfactory experience. We apologize and never intend to provide less than superior service to our customers.
I can confirm that your order for services has been processed and your service turn on date is accurate on your order confirmation. I have resent your order confirmation to your email on file just to be sure you receive it.
We appreciate your feedback and want to be sure to demonstrate that we take it seriously. Our supervisor has reviewed the call with the Customer Service Representative and coached them on their listening skills and call pacing, and we'll monitor their performance closely to ensure improvement.
It's our goal always to deliver a world-class customer experience, so please let me know if you have any questions or concerns.
Our program uses templates that can be quickly customized with details specific to the actual experience. We've identified the most common escalations and created a simple inventory of customizable responses to help accelerate the process and minimize impact to the supervisory team. Each template includes a validation of the customer experience, a affirmation of our commitment to deliver a high quality experience, and specific items to address their open questions or concerns. Escalations are tracked to deliver additional insights and the process ensures Supervisors receive ongoing feedback on the CSAT performance of their teams. In all, Closed Loop improves performance across the board, and significantly enhances service delivery to customers.
Best of all, individual customers genuinely value the experience. By taking just a few minutes to personalize a template response and send email to your customer, the company demonstrates customer-centricity and proves to customers that their voices get heard. In many cases, customers will reply with appreciation for the communication, so the company even gets CSAT "credit" for closing the loop. And, keep an eye on your social media because customers often are so surprised by the follow-up that they post a story about the great experience to their social channels. There's no better promoter of your business than a happy customer whose voice gets heard.