10 Most Common Customer Satisfaction Survey Mistakes to Avoid

A strategy that most businesses use to engage with their clients is customer experience surveys. These feedback surveys provide a way to collect client opinions in regard to the customer service experience and the company’s products or services. Consequently, it is important to master common customer satisfaction survey mistakes to guide you in getting the full potential of your survey.

In this blog, you will learn the purpose of conducting feedback surveys and the common client satisfaction survey mistakes made when creating them.

Reasons for carrying out CSAT surveys

Businesses conduct customer feedback surveys to assess the level of satisfaction of their clients. Similarly, they also want to know their customers’ experiences and what clients think of the company’s brands or services.

Additionally, the feedback surveys help in the analysis of the level of satisfaction and discover areas that the business needs to improve. Consequently, it ensures the continued growth of the company and improves customer experiences.

For the best results, it is key to avoid making common customer satisfaction survey mistakes while creating the feedback surveys.

General customer satisfaction survey mistakes to avoid

Customer satisfaction survey mistakes prevent businesses from getting accurate and relevant feedback from their clients. The main customer satisfaction survey mistakes that businesses make include:

1. Using biased questions

Customers should have the freedom to provide honest feedback. Asking biased questions that restrict to certain answers denies clients that chance. Sometimes, you might write CSAT survey questions in a way that gives clients limited choices on the answers to give.

These questions intentionally push or lead clients to respond with specific answers that the managers want to receive. This strips the clients of the choice to respond genuinely to their liking.

As a result, the survey reports generated based on that feedback will be unreliable and inaccurate. Therefore, companies should avoid biased and misleading questions to generate the best survey reports.

2. Forcing customers to participate in surveys

Sending too many survey reminders within a short period can be nagging to clients. It will leave them irritated and frustrated with your surveys. As a result, they will likely opt out of business with your company and switch to your competitors.

For this reason, it is ideal to send surveys only when necessary.

3. The goal or purpose of the survey is not defined

Another customer experience survey mistake is to have unclear goals for the survey. Before you send survey questions to clients for feedback, ensure you know what you want to learn.

It is crucial to know the objectives or goals for creating the feedback surveys first. Similarly, you ought to know whether the likely responses you will receive will help you get the answers you seek. This will help you create clear questions that are straight to the point.

4. Asking vague questions

One mistake most businesses make is asking vague questions that clients can misunderstand or interpret in different ways. Unclear questions that clients need help to understand make them provide unhelpful feedback. This is because they become confused about what exactly you expect them to answer. For example, compare these two questions:

• Was the customer service good?
• How was your customer service experience?

The first question isn’t clear thus giving the customer a room for one-word answer such as “Yes” or “No.” Also, it doesn’t explain what exactly “customer service” means. Is it referring to the purchasing process or a recent support incident? On the other hand, the second question gives the customer a chance to provide detailed feedback.

With detailed feedback, you can drill down to find enlightening details about the client’s satisfaction. Thus, the survey should include questions that are precise and straight to the point that also encourage in-depth responses.

5. Using same formats for all questions

Creating all your survey questions using one method can be quite limiting. There are different styles of writing survey questions. Some styles are better suited than others for getting specific feedback from clients. Common survey styles are open-ended, closed-ended, and numerical ratings.

Using open-ended questions leaves room for clients to give feedback with no restrictions. They are ideal for collecting detailed information for support leads to analyze and then take actions to improve.

However, open-ended questions are time-consuming to answer. They are also quite difficult to analyze since there are many different responses from different clients.

On the other hand, using closed-ended questions, such as multiple-choice questions and numerical rating scales, are ideal for fast responses on qualitative surveys. They are brief and more likely to get feedback. However, they only offer specific responses that may not fully capture clients’ feelings.

Therefore, it is advisable to use a mix of question types to conduct surveys. Using both open-ended and closed-ended questions can help support leads know the experience of the clients well.

6. Collecting irrelevant feedback from clients

Every question you create must be a vital part of the survey. These surveys are not only meant to determine whether clients are satisfied but also point out areas of the business that they need to improve.

However, sometimes no action is taken after receiving responses to surveys, and clients’ feedback becomes irrelevant. This should not be the case because it wastes the company’s and customers’ time, effort, and resources.

Consequently, it is ideal to conduct surveys only when feedback is required. Less effort and time will be spent by both the clients and the support team. This will, in turn, boost the company’s productivity as it spares resources.

7. Drafting questions that are too long or too short

Customers value their time. For this reason, long survey questions can be too time-consuming for clients to read through and respond. One common customer satisfaction survey mistake is to draft very long questions. Avoid using wordy and complex questions because they make clients reluctant to provide responses and they may opt out of the survey.

On the other hand, very short questions return less information, which might not be enough for you to analyze. Therefore, create questions that are of reasonable length and well structured. This will ensure clients spend minimal time answering the survey but still provide insightful feedback.

8. Asking very personal questions or none at all

It is important to have an idea of who your customers are. For this reason, you can include basic demographic questions in your survey when necessary. These demographics include personal information such as age, gender, and occupation. Such details help in understanding your target client base better.

Additionally, avoid including very personal questions. Some information might be too sensitive for clients to share, and they might feel their privacy is being breached.

Due to this, it is advisable to make demographic questions optional. You can provide options for clients to opt out of the customer service experience survey or skip these questions. Alternatively, you can provide options such as “Prefer not to say” or “Other” so that clients can decide what they feel comfortable sharing and what they don’t.

9. Using complex language that is difficult to understand

Different correspondents have different levels of understanding. Using difficult language, such as complex terms and vocabulary in your customer service experience survey is highly discouraged. Write the questions in language that any client, regardless of their literacy level, can easily understand and respond to. Also, use a friendly tone in your survey to make them comfortable.

10. Publishing surveys in a hurry

You might be under pressure to conduct customer service experience surveys within a short period. This can lead to the publication of feedback surveys that have grammatical errors, are vague, or miss key details. Clients who encounter such surveys might get confused or submit inaccurate feedback.

It is important to focus on details while drafting feedback survey questions. Whenever you create customer service experience survey questions, proofread the entire publication before you release it to clients for feedback. Take your time to ensure all the details are included and are in the right order in the feedback survey to avoid confusing clients.

To know more about the benefits of a good customer service experience survey, refer to this blog.

Conclusion

It is important to design the most efficient and relevant survey to get the best feedback from clients. Avoid all the customer satisfaction survey mistakes listed in this blog that can hinder you from creating and conducting an ideal survey to gauge your clients’ level of satisfaction.

With BoldDesk, get the best feedback survey tools. Try the BoldDesk free trial today for the best customer feedback results. Contact the BoldDesk support team if you have any questions.