Asking for feedback from customers can seem like a daunting task, or like you're asking too much from them. However, getting feedback is a great way to improve your business processes, help you understand your customers better, and learn about features they are interested in.
We're going to talk about how to ask for feedback, and what exactly to ask for.
The Benefits of Asking for Feedback
Having happy customers is important for your business. It leads to repeat sales, great word of mouth, and fantastic testimonials! Getting feedback from your customers isn’t overwhelming if you have a plan.
Word of Mouth
Most people that are happy with a product or service will tell others about it. That means that those that are unhappy will likely talk even more about their experience. Having a good, lasting impression assures customers you’ll put them first.
If you aren’t asking your customers what you can improve upon, you may never know.
Identifying Problems to Make a Better Product
Acquiring perceptive feedback helps your company with service and product development ventures. You’re able to put together a service and product they love because it’s based on the features they’ve said they want.
Don’t be discouraged by complaints from customers, but rather use them as a launching pad to better your business.
How to Ask for Feedback
You don’t have to feel bothersome when asking for feedback. Customers exist who are willing to fill out questionnaires, provide valuable reviews, or complete surveys for you. Let’s take a look at a few of the ways to ask your clients for their thoughts.
Putting a Survey on Your Website
One of the best ways to get feedback is by putting a survey directly onto your website. An email or phone call can easily get lost, but a popup causes the user to stop what they are doing and respond at that moment. They can’t avoid it.
Keep your popup survey short and to the point. Minimize the number of questions to about 1-3. If you ask more than just yes or no questions, you’ll get more valuable responses out of people. Yes or no questions are still okay, however, if they are appropriate for what you’re asking. For example, “Did you find what you were looking for?”
Your survey is configurable to show to just returning website visitors. With these parameters enforced, your popup will only trigger when someone has been to your website before and is actively engaged in your content.
Website Buttons
Similar to a popup survey, a feedback button on your website is another easy way to collect data. The feedback button may be as simple as allowing the user to give you a 1 to 5-star rating or asking them on a sliding scale how pleased they are with your product or service.
This type of feedback only requires a couple of clicks on the user’s part, so it may be good to start with this if you’re struggling to attain feedback.
Incentive Offers
Have you ever filled out a form in response to an email you received about being entered in a drawing or getting a gift card? Incentives are great to offer customers for completing a survey. If you know you’ll get a good response, pull together sweepstakes so you don’t have to go over the company budget.
If you don’t think the response will be huge, or you’re just trying it out for the first time, offer a small gift card, free ebook, coupon, or prize to those users who fill out the survey.
Hosting a Lunch and Learn
Asking people to come to your office to meet with you one-on-one to provide feedback may be intimidating. Hosting a lunch and learn or a meeting with a large group of people is a great way around this. It helps your customers feel comfortable and open to providing honest thoughts.
Centre your meeting around a free lunch for attendees or a training opportunity to teach about new products or services and leave time at the end for attendees to fill out a short survey. Have them hand it in on their way out the door. You’ll have a little backend work to do, transcribe them into a digital format, but their thoughts will likely be sincere.
Run Some User Tests
We’ve talked a lot about using forms and surveys as a way to collect information, but they aren’t the only ways to get good feedback from users. Running a usability test with your users is an innovative and unique way to get them talking about your process, product, or service.
This is particularly good if you’re looking to explore how users interact with your website daily. The tool allows you to upload a screenshot of your webpage, test different logo variations, and a variety of marketing collateral.
The users are shown your page for 5 seconds and then asked to provide their opinion on what they saw, what left an impression, and what they remember. Their responses are then given to you and you can use them to improve different areas of your website.
You’ve Collected Feedback, Now What?
Now that you know how to ask for feedback, what do you do with the feedback? Surveys and responses are great, but if you don’t use them to better your company, it’s just a waste of time.
If you asked for opinions about a product or software, listening to the feature customers want added or changed is your top priority. If someone had great feedback, consider reaching out to them to ask them for a testimonial for your website. Post reviews on social media. Leverage the feedback you’ve received to improve on weak areas.
Reach out to us today if you're interested in getting started!
