This is a contributor’s blogpost …
It’s important to know what people think about your company. This is all part of getting the data you need to improve your business. It doesn’t only give you ideas about how to improve your service directly. Some of these methods will also expose you to the relevant views of people who aren’t even your customers!
With all of this data, you can also improve your marketing. Because that’s what marketing is, after all. First, you find out, to the best of your ability, what people are already thinking. Then you use that knowledge to improve and market your product.
But how do you find out what people think about your business? Here are some essential suggestions for you.
Photo courtesy of Wikimedia
Allow for reviews on your website
If you own a retail website, then you should allow for reviews of the items. This review process should also give customers the opportunity to review the service they received. This can be the best way of measuring your reputation, and this blog shows the importance of a business reputation. Was the packaging okay? Was the item delivered in time? The answers to these will expose potential problems.
Read comments on your social media page
If you don’t have a social media page for your business, then you’re doing it wrong! It doesn’t only allow for amazing marketing techniques. It also puts you in direct contact with fans. Quite often, when businesses post content on social media, users will leave comments on that post. Make sure you go through all of these comments! Many of them may be about your business in general, instead of just the content at hand.
Photo courtesy of Public Domain Pictures via Pixabay
Survey a wider audience
If you want to get data from a wider audience than just your immediate fanbase, you should look into having surveys completed. You can create surveys and have them sent out to millions of people. This will increase the expanse of your opinion data tremendously.
Use your mailing list to ask people
You have a mailing list, right? Email subscriptions aren’t a thing of the past! They’re alive, kicking, and very useful. Send an email to your subscribers with a polite request for any feedback. You can ask for ideas and suggestions, or simply comments on previous experiences.
Photo courtesy of Wikimedia
Encourage feedback during communication
When you’re speaking to a customer, either online or on the phone, give them an opportunity to leave feedback. At the end of the exchange, you can ask them if they’d like to leave a review of the customer service. Companies usually find a way to allow the customer to give feedback to a third party, which is then returned to the company. Otherwise, the customer may be reluctant to give bad feedback directly to the employee who served them. That might sound good to you, but it means that problems don’t get solved!
Have a look through independent sources
That thing I said just there about the difficulty of giving negative feedback directly to a company? It’s true that many people don’t feel comfortable going to the website directly with complaints. It’s a shame, because it means the issue is harder to solve. Consumer review websites like Trustpilot are good places to find out what consumers think about you!
