What Do Customers Want? Ask Them

Posted by Deborah Chaddock Brown on November 23, 2009 under Connecting Moments, Listening, Perceptions | Be the First to Comment

We say it all the time, but how often do we ask our customers what they want, what they value, what experience they desire?

I remember IN THE OLD DAYS when I worked for Pearle Vision, we’d hire a company to conduct exit interviews. People would stand outside the store and ask customers a series of questions.  Or customers would be called and asked a series of questions.  The responses were interesting but it took forever to gain enough of a sampling to provide real value. 

Now thanks to the Internet, there are a variety of ways you can connect with customers and ask for their feedback:

Survey Monkey.  There is a basic free service that allows you to create a survey to send via a link to your customers or prospects. It is easy to use and allows you to create questions that are multiple choice with one answer or more than one; questions that required the reader rank their responses and options for a blank comment section for people to share their views.  It tabulates and provides reporting to help you easily analyse the data.  Gotta love FREE.

Facebook now has pay per click ads that allow you to target your message to specific people within your fan base.  You can select criteria from anything in the fan’s profile; age, interests, location, etc.  Much more targeted than any other pay-per-click option.

LinkedIn Questions.  Ask a question of the professionals in your network.  Questions are categorized by subject, industry, corporate title – you have the opportunity to target who the question in sent to and the responses provide valuable information.  Just check out the Answerstab on your LinkedIn account to see what people are asking and answering.

What is it they say….”You’ll never know if you don’t ask.”

Or how about this:  “The answer is always NO unless you ask the question.”

As we close out another year and set our sites on 2010; consider asking your customers/prospects about your business and how you might meet their needs even better in the coming year.