Choosing the right way to obtain customer feedback

Choosing the right way to obtain customer feedback may be the most important decision you ever make as a businessperson. It's like a marriage or anything else, any other kind of important relationship. Communication is the name of the game, communication is key. Conversation, back and forth, dialogue, question and answer, complaint and solution, etc., create lasting bonds between husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, friends and friends, customers and businesses, and so forth. You want to know at all times what your customers are thinking. You want to know at all times what your customers are wanting. You want to know at all times what's bothering your customers, what's pleasing them, what would please them more, what would bother them less, etc.
Right now you're probably thinking: Of course! I knew all that already. The question here is one of choosing the right way to obtain customer feedback. Well, to get right down to it, the real question is one of choosing the right ways to obtain customer feedback, because the more ways the better.

- Why is it better to have more ways than one when it comes to choosing the right way to obtain customer feedback? That's a fair question. After all, the Internet seems to connect everybody and everything these days, and the Internet may be the best and most effective way for you to obtain customer feedback. But funny as it sounds, many of your customers may not know how to use the Internet as effectively as you do. Many of your customers may be frightened and confused by computers, filled with loathing by them. You want their feedback, too. So you'll need to think of ways of hearing from them that don't necessitate a computer monitor. An obvious point, but an important one to keep in mind.
- So, you're choosing the right ways to obtain customer feedback. What are the usual ways in which companies obtain good, solid, valuable customer feedback? What are the tried and true ways? What are the traditional ways, the ones that seem to work no matter how often they're used?The telephone comes to mind. It's probable that the vast majority of your customers will have a certain expertise when it comes to telephones, considering how long they've been around and the simplicity of their function. So, one sure way of obtaining good customer feedback is to provide your customers with a phone number to call if they want to give you feedback. If they want to complain, grouse, praise, offer suggestions, whatever. Print it somewhere they'll see it; put it in the papers; put it on television; put it magazines; put it on the Internet. Already you've chosen one sure way of obtaining customer feedback.
- In choosing, though, you're also choosing to hire more employees, folks who'll sit and answer the phones and be polite and write down and report precisely what's said and so on. Every decision comes with a consequence. And it's true that the Internet is the ideal way to obtain customer feedback. The Internet means communication between far-flung places that's basically instantaneous. You can know in an instant what your customers in Japan, England, and Australia are thinking and feeling and needing. And it seems that lots of people do enjoy expressing themselves via the written word via the Internet.
- If the Internet is the right way to obtain customer feedback, it means just as much work as telephones or anything else. You've got to create a website, and not only that, a website with an area in which customers can say how they feel. Chances are, you'll get a lot of customers typing a lot of sayings and feelings. Who's going to read them? Who's going to respond to them? How will your customers know they're being listened to, how will they know their feedback isn't vanishing uselessly into the ether? These are some of the questions you'll have to answer when choosing the right way to obtain customer feedback.