Voice of Customer: The Essential Guide & Checklist

Voice of Customer (VoC) is a research approach to gathering the needs, comments and feelings of your customers. It enables you to understand your customers’ opinions about your company, products and/or services, providing valuable information for shaping an enhanced customer experience.

One of the first mistakes in product development is to think that your software will provide the solution to a problem, without having validated these problems upstream with real users. Voice of Customer will enable you to collect this valuable information, analyze it and then deploy an action plan to increase the satisfaction of your customers and prospects.

There are 4 main reasons why you should carry out a Voc:

#1 Get closer to your customers:

The Voice of Customer offers you the opportunity to engage in a real-time conversation with your customers to constantly look for ways to improve your services.

#2 Validate a problem and a solution:

This will enable you to identify a real problem reported by your customers and work towards resolving it.

#3 Optimize an existing product:

If you already have a product in place and aspire to improve it, you can conduct a Voice of Customer analysis, welcoming feedback from your customers, whether positive or negative, to take your product to the next level.

#4 Understand needs and validate your product/service offering:

Conducting a Voice of Customer survey will not only help you pinpoint your customers’ needs, but also confirm their understanding and expectations of your products.

The questions you’ll ask during a Voice of Customer will vary according to the category of VoCs involved. So it’s important to be familiar with existing VoC categories.

#1 Problem discovery and confirmation

By listening carefully to customer feedback and complaints, companies can identify the major issues facing their customers. This category of VoC helps identify gaps and understand the specific challenges customers face in their journey.

#2 Solution validation

VoC is used here to validate solution ideas proposed by the company. Customer feedback is used to adjust and refine solutions, ensuring that they meet real customer needs and expectations.

#3 Finding the right price

Customer feedback plays an essential role in determining the right price. By understanding how customers perceive the value of a product or service in relation to its price, companies can adjust their pricing to maintain an optimal balance.

#4 UX/UI optimization

Customer feedback on user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) is crucial to delivering a user-friendly, intuitive platform. By analyzing feedback on navigation, visual design and ease of use, companies can optimize these aspects for increased customer satisfaction.

#5 Discover and optimize marketing channels

VoC helps to understand which marketing channels are most effective in reaching target customers. By assessing customers’ communication and promotional preferences, companies can tailor their strategies to maximize their impact.

By integrating these 5 VoC categories into your decision-making process, you can significantly improve your products and services. By actively listening to your customers, you can not only solve specific problems, but also refine your strategies, optimize your offering and strengthen customer engagement. VoC helps create a solid relationship between you and your customers, fostering retention, loyalty and long-term growth.

Preparing your Voice of Customer

The first step in the VoC process is preparation. Before you dive into collecting feedback, take the time to clearly define your objectives. You need to know what you want to achieve through this process. Do you want to improve your product, identify new features or increase customer satisfaction? Well-defined objectives will guide your actions and help you obtain relevant feedback.

Careful identification of your target audience is essential. Focus on specific groups of customers, taking into account their demographics, product usage behaviors and satisfaction levels. This targeted approach will enable you to tailor your questions more precisely and gather more detailed information.

Designing effective questions

Designing effective questions is crucial to getting useful answers. Start with your objectives: what answers do you need, in what quantity and with what quality? Be sure to ask both open-ended and specific questions to obtain detailed information.

Remember the example of Henry Ford and the iPhone, who created innovative products: customers don’t always know what they want until they see it. So ask probing questions to uncover potential needs that your customers may not yet have identified.

Taking action and communicating

Once you’ve designed your questions, it’s time to take action. Set aside time in your schedule for collecting feedback. Use tools such as Calendly to automate bookings and simplify the process for your participants. You can even offer gift cards to encourage people to participate.

Involve journalists to showcase your participants and create interesting content around their expertise, or use the blogging technique to exploit the information gathered and create relevant content.

Respecting the 3 Golden Rules of VoC

There are three golden rules to keep in mind when conducting a VoC:

• Opt for live interaction to capture non-verbal expressions and emotions.
• Record sessions to replay and analyze non-verbal signals. Tools like BerryCast can help.
• Don’t delegate feedback gathering. There’s no substitute for listening directly to your customers’ voices.

Fight the Ugly Baby Syndrome

When collecting feedback, adopt an open attitude and encourage frank and constructive comments. Look for “straight talk” and encourage negative feedback, as this is often where opportunities for improvement lie.

In conclusion, there’s no getting away from the Voice of Customer process! It requires careful preparation, judicious questioning, proactive communication and an attitude open to feedback, even negative. By following these steps and respecting the golden rules of the VoC process, you’ll be well equipped to gain valuable insights and continually improve your business.