Allegiance Blog

Allegiance recently conducted a focus group of VOC practitioners at leading companies. One of the questions asked was: What is on your wish list for what you’d like to see in a VOC program in the future? Read this post to view a few of the responses and add your own.

There is a lot of talk in the industry about making Voice of Customer data more actionable. But to achieve this, you must first understand the type of data that is uniquely available and actionable in a successful VOC program. VOC programs fail most often because they provide just scores, changes in scores, or data that is only part of the solution. Actionable data is data that you can use to improve the operations of the company. It goes beyond answering “what” to understanding “why.”

With the growth of digital transactions, more consumer data is becoming available through smartphones, GPS, mobile banking, etc. The availability of “big data” means marketers and customer experience professionals have the potential to gain deeper insight into customer behavior.

Together with price and product, customer voice has become the accepted third tool that top companies use to beat out the competition. These companies are doing more than merely measuring customer satisfaction or driving marketing campaigns. They are using customer feedback to drive change among their many business units. Read on for some specific examples.

Listen to what leading VOC practitioners Arkadi Kuhlmann of ING Bank and Jim Bampos of EMC Corp. are saying and what led to their success(es) in this interview on BlogTalk radio. Then tune in to Allegiance Radio on BlogTalk radio each week. It’s a fun way to engage, learn and share best practices for success.

A sold out attendance Voice of Customer (VOC) professionals and Customer Intelligence experts gathered Monday at the Allegiance Engage Summit to share experiences and discover new ways to leverage customer insights to drive business growth. Read on for some highlights from today’s speakers.

As VOC practitioners, you need to ensure that the data you collect is actionable and relevant to other business leaders in your organization. To help you achieve that goal, join me and VOC practitioners and experts from around the globe on May 15 – 18, 2011, at the Engage Summit 2011. But hurry, we are almost sold out for the event.

Businesses are turning to text analytics systems and technologies to automatically process and analyze unstructured text in all its forms and transform it to be utilized in identifying trends, early warning signs, product issues, suggestions for improvement, and cries for help from customers.

Could your loyalty, satisfaction and engagement surveys also behave as sort of “leading indicators” that affect performance in other areas of your company? If customers are more engaged, will they buy more product? Will they recommend you? Will this have any bearing on inventory, staffing or R&D? Think about designing your VOC program with the intent that the data can trickle down to show relevance in your day-to-day operations and business outcomes.

Customer relationships are dynamic, never static. Customers’ perceptions and beliefs are continuously evolving. Each customer interaction with your company (either direct or indirect) has the power to strengthen, weaken, or destroy customer relationships. Can you afford the risk of not capturing your customers’ voices on a regular and consistent basis?