It is anyone's best guess where customers' loyalties lie. However, a customer loyalty survey uses data and facts to help a company or brand reduce the unknown and identify key drivers in measuring returning customers.
It is not as easy as a consumer using your product one-time for he or she to indefinitely fall in love and never switch to a competitor.
There are multiple emotional, psychological, and social factors in which encourage recurring usage of a product for consumers.
So what is really driving that brand loyalty? In this blog post, we'll discuss the benefits of conducting customer loyalty research and examples of when best to measure it.
What is a Customer Loyalty Survey?
A customer loyalty survey is a type of online survey in which a company can obtain direct feedback on existing products or service offerings in the market. The survey respondents are typically recent users of a product or service who share in the purchase decision making for their household.
These respondents are often solicited through a company's contact list they've built through newsletters, rewards programs, outreach on social media, or third-party email lists.
The direction you go here may depend on the number of users for your product or service in the general population.
Importance of Measuring Customer Loyalty
In the consumer loyalty survey itself, questions aim to get at the thoughts and opinions of consumers and ultimately how loyal they are to a brand. A consumer loyalty survey focuses on the consumer experience and the key touchpoints within it.
For example, a smartphone manufacturer may work with a consumer loyalty survey company to understand a customer's experience during the initial sale of the phone, the ongoing technical support, and the device end-of-life support.
Some common questions in a customer loyalty survey include:
- Customer satisfaction (CSAT)
- Likelihood to repurchase (LTR)
- Customer effort score (CES)
- Likelihood to Switch (LTS)
- Likelihood to recommend (also known as NPS or Net Promoter Score)
Each of these metrics are widely used across industries to understand different aspects of the customer experience and what about their experience increased their likelihood to buy from a company again.
When is Best to Conduct Customer Loyalty Research?
There is no right or wrong time to conduct customer loyalty surveys.
One way to distribute the survey is transaction-based, in which a survey is sent to a consumer after a purchase has been confirmed. This process can even be automated in real-time, such as pop-ups on a website or survey links on a receipt.
If you have a defined timeline in mind for the consumer loyalty survey project, it is best to send out all of the survey invitations at once to your list of consumers. This option works well with strategic goals for the company, as action can be taken on the survey results for upcoming product development or marketing efforts.
I would also note that customer loyalty surveys make the most sense for companies that have significant competition in the market. Frequently, a key output of the survey is how your company stacks up against competitors in the industry.
Benefits of Consumer Loyalty Surveys
There is no shortage of reasons to consider a consumer loyalty survey. As a consumer loyalty survey company, we'd said the main advantage to conducting this type of market research is identifying the key drivers for consumer satisfaction and loyalty.
Learn what motivates customers to give you their business
As with any quantitative research study, consumer loyalty surveys provide organizations with measurable outputs.
By keeping track of metrics like customer satisfaction or NPS, you can see where you perform well and where there is room for improvement. Whether it is year-over-year, quarter-over-quarter, or some other comparison, you can set strategic goals over time.
See how you compare to competitors
A customer loyalty survey company will recommend using the same questions you've asked about your company to again be asked about your competitors.
The results of a consumer loyalty survey will show direct comparisons about the customer experience for your company vs. competitors.
Understanding where your competition is superior is important for any business. Industry average benchmark scores are also useful to see where your company falls within its entire industry.
Regular engagement with your own consumers
Every so often, it is important to let your customers know you are listening to their feedback and are always striving to improve your products and services to meet their demands.
It is a win-win scenario when consumers can openly share their opinions about their purchase and use of your services, and then directly see the positive changes you've made based on their feedback.
Just be sure to to use a third party for customer surveys.
Example Customer Loyalty Survey Questions
Creating an effective customer loyalty survey involves asking questions that gauge customer satisfaction, identify areas for improvement, and measure the likelihood of repeat business. Here are some example questions that can be included in a customer loyalty survey:
General Satisfaction
-
Overall Satisfaction: How satisfied are you with our product/service?
- Very satisfied
- Satisfied
- Neutral
- Dissatisfied
- Very dissatisfied
-
Product/Service Quality: How would you rate the quality of our product/service?
- Excellent
- Good
- Average
- Poor
- Very poor
Customer Service
-
Customer Support: How satisfied are you with our customer support?
- Very satisfied
- Satisfied
- Neutral
- Dissatisfied
- Very dissatisfied
-
Resolution Time: How satisfied are you with the time it took to resolve your issue?
- Very satisfied
- Satisfied
- Neutral
- Dissatisfied
- Very dissatisfied
Loyalty and Advocacy
-
Likelihood to Recommend: How likely are you to recommend our product/service to a friend or colleague? (Net Promoter Score)
- 0 (Not at all likely) to 10 (Extremely likely)
-
Repeat Purchase: How likely are you to purchase from us again?
- Very likely
- Likely
- Neutral
- Unlikely
- Very unlikely
Product/Service Features
-
Feature Satisfaction: How satisfied are you with the following features of our product/service? (list specific features)
- Very satisfied
- Satisfied
- Neutral
- Dissatisfied
- Very dissatisfied
-
Feature Importance: How important are the following features of our product/service to you? (list specific features)
- Very important
- Important
- Neutral
- Unimportant
- Very unimportant
Value for Money
- Value for Money: How would you rate the value for money of our product/service?
- Excellent
- Good
- Average
- Poor
- Very poor
Improvement Areas
-
Improvement Suggestions: What can we do to improve your experience with our product/service?
-
Missing Features: Are there any features you would like to see in our product/service that are currently missing?
Open-Ended Questions
- Open Feedback: Is there anything else you would like to share about your experience with our product/service?
Contact Our Customer Loyalty Survey Company
Drive Research is a global market research company specializing in qualitative and quantitative methods. Our team of experts are no strangers to customer loyalty surveys. We can assist you with a project to get to the root of how your are performing and what your customers want.
Interested in learning more about our market research services? Contact us below.
- Message us on our website
- Email us at[email protected]
- Call us at888-725-DATA
- Text us at 315-303-2040
Emily Rodgers
A SUNY Cortland graduate, Emily has taken her passion for social and content marketing to Drive Research as the Marketing Manager. She has earned certificates for both Google Analytics and Google AdWords.
Learn more about Emily, here.
