How satisfied are you with this survey?

Oh, the fury this incites in me whenever I'm asked it on a survey I've just invested my precious time completing!

Why do so many companies want to gather this useless information and alienate me in the process? I just don't understand. And I can't believe I'm the only one who feels this way.

In the first place, the concept of satisfaction as it relates to evaluating experience is problematic all on its own. I categorize it as ‘dead language’ because it doesn’t convey anything of import in the context of feedback and actionable data.

To me, as a company, delivering satisfaction is the absolute baseline minimum you do. So, why use this as a measure of performance?

I don't know about you, but I'd much rather my employees and customers were 'over the moon' or 'jumping for joy' about their experience with my company rather than just 'highly satisfied.'

If you’re either not gathering feedback or you’re using a default tool or language, you’re missing the opportunity to gain truly valuable insights that will drive real and specific improvements and innovation while at the same time deepening connection and perceptions of value.

In other words, if you’ve got automated feedback mechanisms built into your business (and, if you don’t, you should), I urge you not to take the easy way out and use generic or standard questions.

You could be doing so much more and better with a well-crafted tool that is customized to your needs, brand, and audience.

Here’s some advice on how to make that happen:

Get clear on your goals and objectives.

1. Broadly define the purpose of your survey or feedback collection.
   What are you trying to understand and gain insight into? This will help you narrow your focus to gather the specific information you need and want.
2. Clarify individual objectives that will help you achieve your goal.
   What area(s) of your business are you evaluating? What processes or systems are you looking to assess? This will make it easier to craft the specific questions you need to ask.
3. Determine what you’ll do with the data and insights.
   How will you apply the feedback to drive improvements and/or innovation? What format does it make sense for the data to be in? This will help you determine the types of questions to ask, i.e., true/false, rating scale, multiple choice, etc.

Brand the survey experience.​
​It’s important that you treat your feedback mechanisms as a significant component of your communications, whether for internal or external audiences.

1. Leverage your brand's voice and personality.
   Ditch the canned questions and answers for ones that sound like they’re coming specifically from your company. Consider how you might phrase things if you were asking them in person. Remember, taking your survey is an opportunity for your audience to engage with you, so make sure it feels like you they're engaging with and not some generic version of you.
2. Connect performance questions to your brand promise and value proposition.
   These are better yardsticks than ‘satisfaction’ for determining how you're doing and identifying how you might improve your audience's experience and perception of your business and value. At the same time, underscoring these key components for your audience helps to deepen their affinity and connection with your brand.
3. Provide appropriate follow-up option(s).
   By providing feedback, someone is indicating that they're invested, to some degree, in your success. So, give them the opportunity to keep investing based on what makes sense for you both. Some options might be to:
   a) Participate in a one-on-one interview or focus group.
   b) Provide a testimonial, review, rating, or referral.
   c) Join your mailing list to stay in the know on news and improvements.
   d) Serve on an internal or external advisory panel or committee.

Like so many things in business, if you want to do it well, you can't just set your feedback loops up and forget 'em. You need to keep evaluating how well they're working for you and providing the information and insights you need to keep improving and growing.

If you'd like some help optimizing your feedback mechanisms and/or analyzing your data and designing a roadmap for growth, you know where to find me.

Until next time,

PS - If you missed it, last week I was reveling in The Sound of Silence.

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