Todd Hollander Market Research

If your company overemphasizes reactive approaches to customer satisfaction and habitually addresses customer service problems as they arise instead of taking proactive measures to prevent them, you may be engaged in a risky business.

This is the conclusion of a cross-industry analysis titled “A Look in the Mirror: The VOC Scorecard” recently released by J.D. Power and Associates.

The research included nearly 4,000 responses from 600 companies participating in J.D. Power’s online Voice of the Customer (VOC) assessment, which provides a snapshot of how a company compares to others in weaving the Voice of the Customer into day-to-day business practices.

The data reveal that a large number of organizations approach customer satisfaction reactively rather than proactively, confusing a commitment to satisfaction with a focus on responding to complaints.

“What we see is that many companies equate their commitment to customer satisfaction to the lengths they will go and expense they will incur to fix a problem once it has occurred,” said Bob Caruso, executive director and VOC leader at J.D. Power and Associates. “A significant number of respondents believe their company lacks a commitment to fixing identified problems in the early stages. This creates an inefficient way to do business that benefits neither customers nor shareholders, and reflects more of an interest in short-term profits than in building long-term customer relationships.”

In general, respondents indicated that their companies are doing only a fair job of meeting customer expectations, as the average score for the VOC Test was only 58 of a possible 100 points.

A copy of the report is available at www.jdpower.com/corporate/library/specialreports/pdf/LookInTheMirror.pdf.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 18th, 2007 at 3:37 pm and is filed under Customer Satisfaction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.