Getting to Know your Customers: Surveys and Engagement

Want to learn more about your target audience and what they want from your business? Why not just ask them? Opening communication channels between your brand and its customers can generate valuable insights to guide your business decisions. It can greatly improve your customer relationships by making your audience feel heard and valued.

Engaging with your customers in person or online via social media is one easy way to gather real-life data straight from the source; and if you’d prefer more structured data or want the option to track customer behavior and preferences over a long period of time, a customer survey may be exactly what you need to really get to know your audience!

Casual Engagement

Gathering feedback and information about your customers doesn’t have to be formal. You can collect a lot of useful information just by observing your customers shopping in your store or engaging in conversation with them at the checkout or in the comments section of your social media posts. By taking the time to have conversations with your customers about their impressions of your business, services, and products, you build rapport and contribute to the construction of strong relationships; all while gathering real feedback from real people that can help your business!

One thing to remember when gathering data in such an informal way is that you will likely hear from a much smaller group of people than you would be able to hear from with a formal, quantitative instrument like a survey. This smaller group of people might not present an accurate picture of who your entire audience really is, or how they feel. It is often recommended that these less formal methods of data gathering be used to uncover potential problems or areas where further research is needed. For example, suppose you speak with a few customers who express low satisfaction with their shopping experience. In that case, you may want to run a survey to see how many of your customers share this sentiment and identify the root cause for their low satisfaction, so that it can be targeted for improvement.

Structured Surveys

Surveys allow researchers to collect and quantify large amounts of data in a structured way so that it can be analyzed and deep insights can be uncovered. Surveys take less time than other data collection methods such as interviews, and can be administered through a number of mediums including phone, email link, social media, mail, pen-and-paper, and more. A well-written and properly structured survey really can provide incredible guidance to business decision-makers!

When looking to run a survey, one option that businesses have is to partner up with a professional research firm to help them generate expertly crafted questions and run advanced data analysis on their survey results. Working with professionals can be extremely helpful for mid- to large-sized companies, those who have complex research questions, or those who want to track their customers over an extended period of time. However, working with a research firm is not the only way companies can access insights generated from surveys. There is a wealth of information and tools available on the internet that make DIY survey projects attainable for businesses and organizations of any size! Tools like SurveyMonkey have changed the game, allowing users to create, deploy, and even analyze and present the data from their own surveys. Check out their article on How To Conduct A Survey for a crash course on the various types of surveys and questions, and how you can successfully create and deploy your own!