Can Market Research Help Create Happier Customers?
Last week I completed a Customer Satisfaction questionnaire that not only impressed me, it left me feeling good about the brand sponsoring the Research - something unusual and therefore hopefully worth sharing.
The survey was from Swissotel (www.swissotel.com), a premium hotel chain with a lower profile than competing global giants such as Hilton, Marriott. I had recently spent a couple of nights with them in Dresden, and was most impressed all-round.
I wasn't surprised to receive an email asking me to evaluate my stay, almost every hotel and travel portal does. What impressed me in the Swissotel effort was how much thought had gone into the way the Survey was executed, and the focus on Research as part of the Brand Experience.
First up, I was asked "How did we make you feel during your visit?" with reference to the following 4 emotions:
welcomed
recognised
comfortable
pampered and cared for (!)
The evaluation options were a very simple "better than expected", "as expected", and "less than expected".
The next few questions were eminently relevant and easy to answer: overall evaluation, value perception, likelihood to return and recommend. There was lots I liked about it without expecting to - I actually felt even better about Swissotel after completing the questionnaire, which is unusual at least for me.
But should it be odd to feel good after completing a piece of MR? Giving feedback, sharing one's views are generally accepted methods of co-opting, even creating goodwill - so the same should in theory be true about Research.
Given that isn't often the case - a guess on my part, happy to be corrected - I wonder if we are all doing enough as a matter of normal practice to engage respondents better, actually make them feel better about the brand in question, without engaging in things which are timely or expensive. Here's my take.
1. Market Research Can and Should be a pleasurable Brand Experience
Swissotel clearly had thought a lot about the Customer Experience - the welcome, the staff attitude, the room features, everything was imbued by a sense of values that had successfully made it off the Strategy document (brand values expressed as words, words, words...) and into a meaningful experience.
For Swissotel, this process of imbual even penetrated the area of Market Research.
The Satisfaction survey had the same sense of care about how the customer felt - the same sense of carefulness, attentiveness and genuine concern. The use of the phrase "pampered and cared for" to me was great - consumer language, not "a brand value", very likely taken straight from qualitative work.
This to me is real branding: it's much more than simply ensuring your brand "look and feel" appears on the survey. I wonder how many of the Surveys we execute day in, day out actually reflect the Values our Companies stand for - maybe it's something we could all pay a little more attention to, rather than simply focussing on questionnaire length, quotas, potential bias, not to mention cost and speed of turnaround.
2. Ask Directly and Up-Front about Feelings - Why Not?
I was astounded - positively - by the first question and its wording: "How did we make you feel during your visit"?
To me this was spot on - staying at a hotel should at best be more than a sense of how good the breakfast buffet was, if there was nearby parking, the presence of free WiFi. Sure those things are important - but if managed in isolation don't necessarily add up to a great experience. For the Swissotel, the question seemed appropriate - the stay was fantastic, and being asked about it contributed to my positive feelings about the brand, created a virutuous, self-reinforcing loop.
Clearly, not all of us work in service industries, and not all in a super-premium segment - but perhaps we all need to take a hint from them: how warmly (or not) do Customers feel about our brand when they come into contact with it? With the advent of mobile internet, this is easily executed, and eminently relevant - even if the answer is neutral.
3. Allowing Respondents Not To Respond is Refreshing.
The Swissotel survey began with a very short introduction, then the following: "If something does not apply to your experience, please leave it blank".
Wow, how refreshing. Isn't this something that those of us working outside of service industries could make use of? So often I feel that with ad hoc quant. surveys we force people at survey programming stage into ticking a box where they may not have an opinion at all.
Sure, we can (and probably do) include a "don't know" box - but maybe a statement such as that suggested above is worth considering, dependent on the subject area. Is it practicable? Interested in others' views.
There was plenty more about the survey I appreciated: it was lovely and short, completion time I guess around 5 - 8 minutes. It asked to provide the name of the hotel Team Member who provided exceptional service, and what precisely they had done to delight - unfortunately I couldn't remember, but wrote as accurate a description as I could.
If there was anything to be improved in my view, it could have been even shorter still, with fewer prompts on things I was asked to evaluate, and maybe 1 or 2 focussed open enders - a true micro survey.
Overall, though, I was amazed: I actually enjoyed participating in an MR Survey. This is the first time I can honestly say I've enjoyed a quant. survey in years.
Are we upping our act, I wonder? Or is it just cudos to the Customer-obsessed folk at Swissotel?
Curious, as ever, as to others' views.