The Gist
- The power of customer data. Companies that use customer data to improve their customer services outperform similar businesses in sales growth by 85%.
- Tracking customer success. There are several tactics to track customer success, such as using monthly recurring revenue, Net Promoter Score, customer churn rate, qualitative customer feedback, leveraging online reviews and implementing a voice of customer program.
- Creating positive chatter. Keeping a check on how quickly consumer inquiries are answered and dealt with will help create a more positive chatter about your brand online.
The Value of Customer Success Metrics
It’s true to say that customers' interactions with brands have changed substantially over recent years. Businesses can maximize customer data collection by appraising marketing objectives against real customer behavior and core targets.
New research reports companies that use customer data to improve their customer services outperform similar businesses in sales growth by 85%.
Sharpening the practice of talking and listening to customers can derive important data that reveals how customers feel about their products and services. Plus, brands can increase the efficiency of customer service and resolve issues more quickly.
As such, businesses need to flex in terms of mapping out the customer journey and measuring customer success to understand their customers better, help relationships thrive over time and increase customer-brand engagement.
Elevate Customer Data Management
The answer may well be found in one key area: data. In recent times, The Economist referred to data as "the world’s most valuable resource."
Customers don’t want to hand out their information to just anybody: gathering, storing and using data sensitively and securely has to be a real priority.
Once you have that precious data and process it through consumer data management, there’s a world of possibilities in understanding your customer, optimizing the customer journey and helping customers thrive long term.
Let’s take a closer look at how consumer data can help your business measure customer success.
After all, any future-facing company appreciates that if they don’t understand customer behavior, they won’t be able to leverage this precious asset — both for the benefit of customers and prolonged business growth.
Related Article: Customer Data: 8 Rights Don't Make It Wrong
Tactics to Track Customer Success
Your customer success manager will know all too well that talking with customers and creating regular touchpoints throughout the customer journey are key to boosting brand awareness and customer success.
That being said, below are tactics to improve your customer data management and your use of customer success metrics for a better-quality customer experience.
Related Article: Challenges or Opportunities? Maximizing Customer Data to Thrive in 2023
1. Monthly Recurring Revenue
A great place to start is with monthly recurring revenue (MRR) from your customers. Work out how much customers spend with you each month by multiplying your total number of monthly customers by the average revenue per customer.
This is a particularly strong tactic for monthly subscription companies as it helps monitor revenue more closely.
2. Net Promoter Score
Using a Net Promotor Score (NPS) is a really simple way to get instant, direct quantitative and qualitative customer feedback.
Put simply, it’s a one-question survey — often sent over email or other digital channels, that asks your customer to rate how likely they would be to recommend your product or service to someone else.
Many see it as a way to measure how loyal a consumer is to a brand, a solid metric that’s helpful for all businesses.
3. Customer Churn Rate
Knowing how many customers you lose or churn is the bread-and-butter data. Brands can scrutinize their customer churn rate with the following formula:
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- Lost customers are divided by the total number of customers in a time period x 100.
- So, if you lost five customers and had 500 customers, you divide five by 500 and x by 100.
- This would be 5 / 500 = 0.01 x 100 = 1%.
Then, the next move would be to organize a qualitative survey to discover why those customers churned. Brands can learn a great deal about their processes through churn analysis.
4. Qualitative Customer Feedback
There is gold to be found for brands in qualitative surveys. This is where you dig deep and really ask the questions you want to know about the consumer experience, both from those who churn and those who are loyal.
You can send your customers surveys in a variety of formats, over email, SMS or social channels. If you know where your customers hang out, you’re likely to get a speedier response because you’ve made the process smoother and easier for them.
5. Leverage Online Reviews
Brands that take part in online conversations with their customers can transform their customer satisfaction metrics. It’s clear from online review websites like Reddit, PissedConsumer.com or Quora that brands are stepping up full-spectrum customer communications.
Being where your customers are is at the heart of great customer service and can provide dynamic customer data to help evolve your ways of working to better suit customers.
That direct interaction between the company and the customer is priceless. And it’s public, so potential consumers have evidence of your productivity and the swift, effective ways you respond to inquiries or issues. This will only build more trust, both with your existing customers and potential clients who might be researching your products and services.
Communication through online reviews can also be used as a complementary approach to derive valuable information about success with customers to positively evolve brand perception and loyalty.
6. Voice of Customer Program
All aspects of your business, from customer services to sales and marketing, can glean plenty of useful information about customer satisfaction when you create a voice of customer (VoC) program.
Consumers who have a positive experience with your company are more likely to return. VoC can amplify how your teams analyze, predict and understand how customers behave and feel about your product or service.
You can collate information for a VoC program from a variety of sources, including community forums, social media channels and feedback forms. This data supports all departments to connect, communicate and collaborate on what customers need across their whole journey.
7. Contact Resolution Rate
Keeping a check on how quickly consumer inquiries are answered and then dealt with will help create more positive chatter about your brand online. Customers talk and share opinions about brands in customer forums or other social channels.
Research showed that responding to customers within the first 24 hours after an inquiry or complaint can transform the way customers view your brand, leading to a more positive perspective that will then be shared with other consumers.
Knowing how quickly on average your customer issues are answered, even if it’s with an acknowledgment message, will help you manage your customer relationships and improve standards in customer service.
Harness Consumer Data to Strengthen Customer Success
Using data as a launchpad to create positive information management practices will improve your customer service processes, harmonize your teams and, ultimately, benefit your customers with a streamlined customer experience.
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