"Building a Customer Satisfaction System: Effective Listening When the Customer Speaks"

Martin Stein and Maurice Bowen

Journal of Organizational Excellence

Summer 2003, pp. 23-34

After analyzing 28 customer satisfaction programs in the automotive industry, the authors of this article found that typical program elements included:

1. initial product quality survey
2. service reminders
3. initial service survey
4. loyalty service survey
5. loyalty appreciation
6. loyalty survey
7. thank you letters
8. referral letters

The article contains an exhaustive list of potential areas where a company may want to develop measures and indicators that "can help it understand what influences customer behavior and loyalty (positively and negatively); track the effects of actions it takes to attract customers and to increase satisfaction and loyalty; discover opportunities for additional revenues/sales; and other factors important to its goals." A total of eighty different potential areas are listed under the following categories:

1. Product Quality—This includes product-related factors; service-related factors; and information
2. Loyalty—This includes repeat purchase factors; purchase intentions factors; and advocacy factors
3. Customer Satisfaction—This includes pre-purchase factors; purchase factors; and post-purchase factors
4. Customer Database—This includes demographic factors; product history factors; psychographic factors; and internet/technology factors

Key steps used by companies to develop a customer satisfaction program are:

1. Obtain commitment from CEO (CEO involvement is a critical success factor)
2. Evaluate existing programs (threats and opportunities)
3. Design program architecture (specify functionality)
4. Develop grassroots support (get buy-in at all levels)
5. Define program components (surveys, letters, processes)
6. Specify program indicators and measures (perception and behavior)
7. Define and test response mechanisms (continuous learning loops)
8. Develop database (links surveys and other data)
9. Design tracking system (longitudinal, action-oriented)
10. Design reports (cockpit charts, easy to read)

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