customer feedback

There are over 20 million web sites out there right now asking their customers for their comments. 9.5 million companies have ‘tell us what you think’ pages on the web, the company I work for is one of them. 

The range and means by which companies gather customer feedback gets ever more sophisticated. As well as the familiar postal or phone survey, you can give instant feedback via text or touch tone at the end of a call. Online surveys, quizzes and polls. Pressing the smiley faces in the motor way services, dropping a coin in the tips jar in a jeans shop, post cards, comments cards, market researchers, focus groups . . If the variety and ease of giving feedback wasn’t enough to get the customer to speak there are offers of cash, prize draws, free services and products as enticements.

But are we getting the right feedback and what are we doing with it?