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Won’t I Annoy My Clients…
Posted on February 24th, 2010 View Comments
…if I ask for too much feedback?
This question is, almost without exception, the first one asked when we talk to firms about client feedback. The short answer is NO! Not if you ask for feedback when they want to give you feedback.
We are so conditioned to the idea of “feedback” as being a long survey sent to hundreds or thousands of people. These surveys are generic, and don’t offer anything to the person responding. They also usually come after the product or service has been offered, when it’s too late to do anything about it. They are separated from the project, and don’t seem relevant at the time they are sent.
But you already ask for feedback all the time! When you deliver something to a client, don’t you ask “is this what you were looking for?” When you wrap up a meeting, don’t you ask if everything was covered? That’s asking for feedback! It’s not very structured, and it doesn’t always get asked, but no client will ever be bothered if you check with them to make sure you covered your (and their) bases.
Our Client Feedback Tool blends the best from both approaches. While we use email and the internet to deliver surveys, they are not typically designed to be sent broadly (though, they can be). Instead, we’ve built hundreds of templates and supporting processes to send surveys, systematically, in a much more focused manner.
When should you ask for feedback (i.e., send a survey)? Send one every time your client may want to give you feedback. No client waits around to answer a mass survey. If you send that out monthly, it’s too much. On the other hand, if you give your client a key deliverable every week, don’t you want to make sure, each time, that you’ve given him what he needed/expected? You could call or email asking “did you get what you need?” Or, you could send a short feedback request that digs a little deeper and gives you more data, while not really taking any more time.
Odds are, you’ll only annoy your clients if you ask them for feedback two months AFTER a project is over as part of a quarterly survey. It’s too late to fix, so why ask now?
Instead, show clients you care. Ask for feedback when it makes sense. Deliver something? Ask for feedback. That easy. Since asking via The Client Feedback Tool is a simple email, clients can always ignore/delete it. Even that gives you feedback! NOT responding, in essence, let’s you know that things are most likely going well enough they don’t feel a need to correct anything. However, for every few times they ignore your request because things are going okay, there will be one time when they have feedback, and will be glad you asked. And they’ll respond. Until you ask, you don’t know. So, you have to ask. And ask again.
If you’re still concerned, ask your clients! Find out from them when they’d like to be asked for feedback. Odds are, it’s more often than you think.
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The Best Questions to Ask – Deliverables and Relationships
Posted on April 17th, 2009 View CommentsThe most effective type of client feedback covers a wide variety of issues related to the efforts that a professional services firm makes for their clients. In order to be useful, the feedback must also accurately capture the clients’ perception of how the service providing firm performed relative to the client expectations. This is a critical aspect for feedback to be able to help a firm understand their client and how to most quickly create the maximum value. If the firm did not meet the expectations of their client, a problem is created that if unnoticed and left unattended, can fester into a major issue or a liability insurance claim. With the typical cost of claims at over $300,000 /year and each claim averaging about 3 years duration, that’s a million dollar misunderstanding.
However, whether the firm exceeded the client’s expectations or not, effective feedback will contain sufficient specifics to allow the firm to understand exactly what the client either appreciated or objected to. In surveying clients for their feedback, we have found that the shorter and simpler the survey, the greater number of surveys are returned with feedback. Our research has shown that a survey that takes more than a few minutes to complete will be abandoned by 95% of people.The ultimate challenge of gathering effective feedback is to make the survey very comprehensive while also being very concise. Over the years, we have distilled the survey questions in our patent pending Client Feedback Tool to a grand total of six. In order for only six questions cover a wide gamut of client service issues we divided the topics covered into two main categories: Deliverables and Relationships. “Deliverables” inventory the client’s perceptions on WHAT the design firm produced. “Relationships” questions collect feedback on HOW the firm’s process worked. Deliverable questions focus on things while relationship questions focus on people.The key factors regarding the Deliverables include how well the design firm’s products:- Attended to the Schedule goals of the project
- Addressed the Budget parameters of the project
- Included the appropriate Accuracy required to be effective
The key factors regarding the Relationships include how well the design staff’s process:- Offered the Helpfulness needed by the client
- Included the Responsiveness desired by the client
- Contained the level of Quality sought by the client
This breakdown of categories was honed to produce the most constructive feedback for professional service firms while also allowing the client the most succinct but satisfying opportunity to offer feedback to help produce the most successful project. While the firm gets full credit for being proactive and professional in asking for feedback, the client becomes more involved and engaged in the project and therefore feels more ownership in the outcome.
A survey tool that includes one question in each of the above six categories, particularly if the survey uses our specialized process-oriented question format and detailed numeric answer slider can collect valuable, objective, actionable feedback for a professional services firm in only two minutes of a client’s day.
