Your goal as a business owner is to always strive for continued growth and improvement for your business. In order to do this, you have to listen to your customers and give them what they want. The problem is—you can’t do that if you don’t know what it is they want. That’s where customer feedback comes into play.

Customer Feedback Is Always A Good Thing

Whether positive or negative, feedback from your customers is the best way to gain insight into your business. If you get good feedback on a particular part of your business, you know that you should continue to do whatever it is you are doing for that particular part. If you get negative feedback, you know that there are some things you might need to change or work on.

With knowledge about your customers’ wants and needs, you can make your business more appealing to them. With that being said, it’s important to ensure that your business continues to innovate. If you leave everything the same, even if it’s working, over time your customers will get bored. To avoid this, always think of ways to keep your product or service exciting and utilize customer feedback to do so.

“The successful exploitation of new ideas is crucial to a business being able to improve its processes, bring new and improved products and services to market, increase its efficiency and, most importantly, improve its profitability.”

Getting Informative Feedback

Now that we know how important customer feedback is, the question is, how do we get it? And it’s not just about getting feedback in general, it’s about getting informative and useful feedback from your customers that you can use to better your business. Here are a few resources you can utilize to get insight from your customers:

Social Media

One of the easiest ways to get instant feedback from your customers is to encourage it on your social media! While you’re using these platforms to post and spread awareness about your business to new customers, ask your current customers what they would like to see. Great questions to ask in your captions might be, “What do you love most about our flower shop?” “What would you like to see more of in our store?” “What can we do better for you?”

Surveys

Surveys are one of the easiest ways to get specific feedback from your customers. By asking the right questions, you can learn important information about your customers’ feelings about your business that you may not receive otherwise. You can learn all about the value of customer surveys and how to design and distribute them on our blog.

Conversations

Something as simple as a conversation can give you so much information. Don’t be afraid to talk to your customers that come into your store and ask them what they like and don’t like about your business! Sometimes a one-on-one conversation can reveal so much more about the things you need to know.

Responding to Feedback

Letting your customers know that you hear them and that their opinion matters to you is just as important as getting the feedback itself. Not only do they want to voice their thoughts, but they also want to know that you care. In order to let them know that, it’s always a good idea to respond to feedback, whether that is publicly or privately. Here are some steps to follow when responding to your customers:

Determine if it is Positive or Negative

If you receive a positive response from a customer, that’s great! But don’t just read it and let it go—thank them! Tell them you appreciate their feedback and that you’re always open to hearing what they have to say. If it’s something worth sharing, ask if they mind if you share their response on your social media. This shows them that you appreciate their business and feedback.

If you get a negative response, remember that it’s okay and that it’s a very useful tool for your business. Take the steps needed to resolve the problem and the customer relationship when you see negative feedback.

Show That You Understand

One of the most important things to remember is that when your customers share their opinions with you, they want to be validated. Instead of telling them that they’re wrong, think about where they are coming from. Put yourself in their shoes and start your response by letting them know that you understand that they had a negative experience and you’d like to figure out what made them feel this way and what you can do to help.

Tell Them Your Plan to Fix It

The next step when responding to feedback is to take action. Let them know that you don’t want them or anyone else to have the same experience, so you’re going to take the necessary steps to fix it. If you have a specific solution to the problem, let them know exactly what it is. Don’t try to just explain away their opinions. Remember that they want validation for their feelings!

Take it Private if Needed

Sometimes it’s best to respond to things privately. If someone makes their feedback public and it includes inappropriate speech or information, that’s a sure sign to take the conversation offline. Other things that might be better resolved one-on-one include very specific concerns that the customer is extremely unhappy with.

Customer feedback is so important to your business, good or bad, and it’s important to encourage it among your customers. Always try to find the solution to every problem, and remember that innovation is key to business success!