May 19, 2012. Paul Hixon
credit: Ed YourdonWhen you’re starting a small business one of the best ways to get feedback is to ask questions of your customers. Not only does this make the customers feel they are valued and being listened to but it also provides you with a huge amount of data that can be very useful for improving your business in many ways.
For example, if you know who your customers view as your main competitor then you can target your marketing effort to showing people how or why you’re better than the opposition.
To make sure that you gather the information you require make out a list of questions that you would like the customers to answer. You can then use the list in a number of different ways. You could give the list to all the people who come into contact with customers and ask them to ask each customer 3 or 5 questions each time they’re serving someone. You could have someone walking around the store asking people questions as they browse. Or, you could give each customer a questionnaire for them to fill out with the promise of being put into a draw for a prize. You could even use the questionnaire as a way to advertise your business – put an ad in a local paper explaining that simply by filling out a questionnaire next time they shop with you they have a chance of winning a prize.
The questions you ask should be pertinent to your business but here is a list of generic questions to get you started.
Why are you buying this product from us?
Why are you not buying this product from us?
How would you rate our product/service/response to problems/follow-up?
How much value you you put on price/quality/delivery time/availability/installation/after sales service etc?
What other features would you like to see from our product/service?
Who do you think are our main competitors?
What do our competitors do better/worse than we do?
How do we compare against our competitor on price/service/quality/after sales etc?
Mr Customer, what are your buying policies? For example, do you have a list of approved suppliers?
How do you make your buying decisions?
Who in your business makes the buying decisions?
Who approves spending in your organisation?
Don’t forget, whenever you’re interacting with customers at any time you should also be aiming to get information details such as names, email addresses and telephone numbers from them, along with permission to contact them in the future with details of offers or other information that might interest them.
Getting honest and truthful answers from your customers can result in you making some crucial changes in your business – from how you deal with complaints right through to how you advertise your business. It can be a really powerful tool for addin{}g dollars to your bottom line.
Updated May 19, 2012. Published June 4, 2011. Paul Hixon
