What managers actually do with customer satisfaction scores!
In an academic survey of 500+ customer service managers in Australia, I found that 78% of organisations (172 respondents) distributed their customer satisfaction survey results to senior management. 43.6% (96 respondents) distributed results to all customer service staff. The clear implication is that 22% of organisations do not inform their senior management of their customers’ satisfaction, and fewer than half of the respondents passed their results on to those in the front line. In the case of some organisations the lack of widespread distribution to junior staff was reported to be for reasons of commercial confidentiality in a highly competitive market environment, but the lack of communication of results to senior management by a significant minority of respondents raises interesting questions! Why would senior management allow money to be spent on the research if they don't see the results, one wonders?
As far as formal action for management in response to the results are concerned, 67% asked specific questions of management, 41% held regular formal follow-up meetings, and 31% circulated results only, without specific action requirements. Again, with a significant minority of respondents having no formal procedures for follow up, the motivations for conducting customer satisfaction surveying at all are questionable.
These results form part of an article recently published in the Journal of Asia Pacific Marketing. For further pre-publication information, please email colin.jevons@ultrafeedback.com or click on the contact links at the bottom of this page.