Most businesses want to know how satisfied their customers are, and what can be done to make them even more satisfied. However, if not done right, then customer surveys used to measure customer satisfaction and loyalty can produce useless or (even worse) misleading results.
Earlier we had made you aware of the dangers of "no frame of reference", "no tracking", and how they can be avoided. Presented below is the third common blunder associated with this type of research – and how you can avoid it.
Third Blunder: Poor sampling.
Many researchers pay inadequate attention to sampling in measuring customer satisfaction via surveys. Who you ask is at least as important as what you ask and ending up with an unrepresentative or otherwise inadequate sample can reduce the validity and reliability of your results.
Solution: Planning and attention to detail are vital to good sampling in using surveys for satisfaction research.
We have several recommendations:
- Do not use convenience samples unless absolutely necessary;
- Try to have respondents from all relevant major customer segments (geography, industry, product/service type, tenure, etc.);
- Make sure you obtain enough responses – both overall and within each segment – to support desired precision and breakouts;
- Stay in the field long enough, and check your data while in the field so you don’t hear from only the most satisfied customers, only the least satisfied, or only the two extremes (not the middle);
- In B2B research, pay attention to both the number of accounts selected and the number (and characteristics) of individuals selected within each account; and
- Think about whether you also want input, at least on some questions, from former and/or prospective customers.
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