Listen to the voice of the customer. When your customers help shape your brand message, they recognize you value their input, which not only gives them ownership of your brand, but also creates advocates who spread the word about your business.
Voice of the Customer (VOC) Definition: Collective insight into customer needs, wants, perceptions and preferences gained through direct and indirect questioning. These discoveries are translated into meaningful objectives that help in closing the gap between customer expectations and the firm’s offeringsBusinessdictionary.com
Why Conduct Voice of the Customer Research?
Insight is at the core of what we call big ideas at Hummingbird Creative Group. Our first step is to talk to your stakeholders, customers and prospects. You’d be surprised at how much your customers will tell us about why they bought from you, but more importantly, the reasons they tell us they come back for more. There are many different ways to gather information from your customers: focus groups, individual interviews, contextual inquiries, ethnographic techniques and more. While there are many different information-gathering techniques, they all rely on a series of structured and in-depth interviews. This process is all about being proactive and nailing down exactly what your customer loves about your brand and letting your brands selling points work for you.
It’s hard to become an industry leader without listening to your customer and what they think about your brand. Perceived quality from the customer is the leading driver of success in business.
Should You Ditch Traditional Methods?
Traditionally, companies approached measuring feedback with the “voting with their wallets” approach; what people were buying was the only metric used. If something was selling, that meant it was doing well enough. But just using that metric isn’t enough– it’s very blunt and doesn’t provide a higher-level understanding necessary to evolve as a brand. When you listen to the customer, you can identify what’s working and what isn’t, where you’re shining and where you need to improve, and whether people are only buying your product because they’re waiting for a competitor or not. Bring the voice of the customer into your organization gives substantially more quality data than traditional methods.
You also have the ability to understand the journey your customer takes to the end– buying your product. Different customers interact with different touch points, different representatives, different products and services, have different post-purchase experiences. Voice of the customer takes a more unified view and averages out those variables. Once you have a complete picture, you can take the information and use it to better build your brand.
What Can You Gain From Listening to Your Customer?
When we talk to your customers to find out why they bought and why they keep coming back, that directly tells us what your competitive advantages are and help identify a truly unique sales proposition from your customers’ perspectives and in their voice. The knowledge gained from our insight conversations will help you have greater clarity into the messaging needed for your organization to accumulate market share and grow brand equity.
The voice of the customer has gotten louder– much louder– and it’s time to take it into consideration.
where ideas take flight
At Hummingbird Creative Group, we build business value through better branding. Contact us to find out how we can build your business’s value:
919 854 9100 | info@hummingbird-creative.com