Four Steps to More Effective Client Surveys
I believe very strongly that “sending client satisfaction surveys” – whenever you send them, and whether you send hard copy or a link to an online survey – are a great way of saying to a client, “Hi there. We didn’t want to waste our valuable time calling you, but we’d like to you to take your valuable time and answer these questions to tell us how good our work is!”
If you really want to do a client survey that will have value, try the following:
- Do it mid-project so if there are any problems, you have time to fix them before the end of the project.
- Survey by phone or in a personal visit; demonstrate how you value the client’s time by spending your own.
- Have a high-ranking firm officer (president, vice president, chairman, division manager) who is not involved in the project make the call/visit; this demonstrates your commitment to fixing things if that’s needed, strengthens the client’s feeling of how you value him or her, and gets the information to people who are high enough in the firm to take action.
- If any action is taken to fix a problem, make sure the client is told what actions you have taken so that he knows you weren’t just blowing smoke to make him or her feel important.
Most important, it is too easy for the client to avoid an unpleasant truth if he is filling out a paper or online form at his desk. A personal visit makes it easier to get at the hard truths that you NEED to hear.
Bernie Siben is the owner of Siben Consult, LLC. He has 30+ years of experience as an in-house marketer and outside consultant providing strategic and marketing services to firms in the “built environment” — planners, architects, engineers, surveyors, construction managers, and environmental consultants. You can learn more about Bernie and Siben Consult, LLC at http://www.sibenconsult.com/.
