Where is Your Firm on the Feedback Management Maturity Curve?

In our previous article on customer feedback management, we discussed the differences between simply collecting customer feedback and having systematic processes to both gather and make effective use of customer feedback. We call this Feedback Management – a set of techniques, processes and tools proven to offer major benefits when deployed consistently over time.

In this article, we introduce the concept of Feedback Management Maturity. We'll define some characteristics of organizations at different stages of the Feedback Management Maturity Curve and discuss some approaches companies can take to move up the curve and reap the associated benefits.

Some Definitions:

Feedback:

“Customer (and employee) feedback provides the foundation upon which successful companies are built. It delivers strategic guidance and actionable insights that enable companies to improve marketing and customer service, to deliver better customer experiences, to develop and refine their products and services over time, and to profitably grow the business.” Jeff Zabin – Analyst, Aberdeen Group

Feedback Management:

Feedback Management is a both discipline and a set of techniques, processes, metrics and tools for systematically collecting feedback, and systematically and effectively acting on the feedback - putting it to work to help achieve the organization’s strategic and tactical business objectives.

Feedback Management Maturity:

The degree to which an organization is effectively practicing the discipline of Feedback Management and realizing the associated benefits. Like many other disciplines, Feedback Management capabilities and practices typically progress through stages on the way to full realization.

The concept of "Feedback Management Maturity" has several implications:

1) it's a journey for any company to attain feedback management maturity;

2) there are some recognizable stages on the way; and

3) as with people, different firms embrace the journey with different approaches.

Some are in a rush to the top (perhaps forced by competition), while others stay at stage 1 indefinitely. The curve diagram above is an attempt to represent the stages that firms go though as they seek to become truly "customer centric" by developing and deploying mature, well-developed Feedback Management capabilities.

Characteristics of firms at different stages of the curve

What's the Value of being high on the curve?

It's simple: the further up the curve a firm is, the stronger the firm's ability to compete and prosper because it is better able to gather, manage and act on strategic and tactical feedback. This provides competitive advantage because the firm can:

• Continuously improve key processes like marketing and customer service
• Deliver superior customer experiences
• Attain high customer satisfaction and loyalty (reflected in metrics)
• Develop and refine new products and services over time
• PROFITABLY GROW THE BUSINESS!

Firms high on the Feedback Management Maturity Curve systematically measure key dimensions of their customers' experience and perceptions, and effectively utilize the insights to manage the business. They measure and manage the business to assure high customer satisfaction, high loyalty, high retention, to develop new products to meet evolving customer needs (which they track), etc.

Over time, these firms rise to the top tier of their industry in terms of growth and profitability. The correlation between strong feedback management capabilities and performance have been studied and documented by authors like Fred Reichheld, inventor of the "Net Promoter" method for measuring loyalty, and organizations like ACSI (American Customer Satisfaction Index). Companies with the highest Loyalty and/or Customer Satisfaction scores are invariably top performers in their sectors.

Where is your firm on the curve?

A few years ago a Gartner Group study found that while 95% of firms collect customer feedback (in one form or another), only 10% were acting on the feedback and only 5% were communicating back to their constituents what they were doing with the feedback. In other words, for the vast majority of firms in the study, the collection of customer feedback wasn't systematic, and they did not consistently or effectively take action based on the information gathered (including "closing the loop" with customers). Even today, the results from most feedback initiatives and/or surveys are treated like market research and end up as a report filed away on the shelf.

Most small and medium sized businesses would recognize themselves as being in the "Getting Started" stage of the curve.

Moving up the Curve
Clearly, effective feedback management gives companies a competitive "edge". So how can your firm go about moving up the curve and developing this edge for your business? Here are a few thoughts on what it typically takes:

• Senior management commitment, sponsorship, involvement.
• Willingness to invest necessary time, resources, budget.
• An empowered team with the right functions represented (including outside help if necessary).
• An internal communications plan to get employees on board, to disseminate results.
• A feedback management tool that meets the organization's needs.
• A "start small" and "prove- the-benefits" approach. Don't take on too much initially.
• Commitment to see it through.

Surprisingly, going from "Getting Started" to "Getting Serious" can be simple and affordable. There are cost effective yet powerful feedback management tools on the market, and if you need outside help, there are many smaller, focused firms you can engage as opposed to hiring expensive "big name" consultants. This way you can jump start your progress to the next stage on the curve, learn how to apply feedback management techniques to your business, and quickly begin to reap the proven benefits of effective feedback management.