When it comes to customer service, don’t let customers be your guinea pigs for internal changes. Here’s an example of what that looks like. What Happened? It was the typical noon-time rush at my local Starbucks—certainly not my favorite time to stop, but I was hungry and wanted a snack. I ordered a drink and […]
Benchmarking the customer experience will not always get you the metrics to grow and improve. But what is benchmarking? Customer Experience Benchmarking Benchmarking has a history of helping businesses compete in global markets. But these days, many companies are missing out on the opportunity to innovate due to an over-reliance on benchmarked metrics. The practice […]
Many companies rely on outcome metrics to measure and improve. The problem is, outcome metrics fall short. When it comes to improving your customer experience, first you need to decide what your goals are. Every company has its own take on customer experience—what are your goals? Perhaps you’re looking to stage the customer experience to […]
Last Updated: June 5, 2025 Companies obsess over survey scores. But the real gold—the part where customers actually say what they think—is buried in the open-ended responses. These unstructured comments are where customers vent, explain, and suggest. It’s where emotion and insight live. And yes, of course, most companies look at them, usually plugging them […]
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If you’re looking for a simple fix for your touchpoints, lose NPS. Last week I spoke at the Society for Service Executives Symposium in Chicago. As always, when the primary topic is customer satisfaction, there was a lot of talk about NPS (Net Promoter Score). As I have often said, it’s a tired customer survey […]
Last Updated: February 17, 2026 Open-ended survey analysis is the systematic process of transforming unstructured text feedback into quantifiable, actionable data. While closed-ended scores (like NPS) track “what” is happening, open-ended analysis explains “why” by identifying specific customer pain points, emotions, and unmet needs. According to Forrester, even a one-point improvement in a large organization’s […]
Chances are, you have a biased customer survey. The good news? You’re not alone and we have the fix. Most customer satisfaction surveys suffer from uneven customer representation, which leads to inaccurate data. As the saying goes, “garbage in, garbage out.” And let’s face it, garbage should never be the basis of your business decisions. […]
Sometimes it’s necessary to break your NPS routine. The NPS question is regularly used in customer feedback surveys. Nearly everyone has seen it: How likely is it that you would recommend us to a friend? What Does It Tell You? This question assumes that customers think in terms of their likelihood to recommend companies—but all […]
Great customer service is something that sticks with you for years. Not too long ago, while checking into a hotel on a damp San Francisco night, the front desk clerk noticed my sniffling and asked if I wanted chicken soup. “That’d be great,” I replied, assuming it was just a sympathetic comment and not an […]
Are you capturing and measuring the real customer experience? How do you know? Customer feedback surveys are great because they can be objective and easy to implement. But they only capture the tiniest slice of the actual customer experience, especially when it comes to the experiences customers have with contact centers. According to CallMiner, companies […]
We’ve written a lot about customer satisfaction survey errors, but, time and again, we see the same mistakes crop up. There are a lot of errors surveys make, but these are 5 of the worst. Check out our latest Slideshare about this topic and read on, because these are the kinds of errors that alienate […]
Customer interviews are an incredibly valuable research tool when used correctly. Satisfaction surveys (done well) are a great way to collect facts about your customers. The problem is, no matter how good they are, they don’t capture your customers’ complex thoughts and feelings—about you, your marketplace and your industry. To get a detailed picture of […]