Measuring Customer Satisfaction - Essay Example

Measuring Satisfaction In the current globalized world, many businesses are adopting strategies that can helpthem to be competitive enough to retain their market share. In addition, many businesses are concerned with making the best returns out of the limited operational budgets in order to survive the existing economic challenges faced by various industries. In order to achieve these objectives, businesses have focused keenly on the customer needs in order to produce products and services that match their expectations. In this regard, focusing on customer needs has not only led to improved sales but has also led to increased customer satisfaction that intern leads to customer retention hence giving such businesses competitive advantage over others. On this basis, this essay will discuss the best practices used to measure customer satisfaction and further evaluate the current practices adopted by Union Pay Organization. To start with, measurement of customer satisfaction has several benefits to businesses. Measurement of customer satisfaction can be defined as a process in which businesses are able to gauge the quality of their processes as well as that of their products and services from customer feedback or other indirect means (Hayes, 2008). As a result of these measurements, businesses can be able to implement and evaluate various processes in their main objectives. For instance, through the customer feedback, businesses are able to gauge themselves against competitors and identify effective strategies that can place give them competitive advantage in the market (Grigoroudis & Siskos, 2010). Further, measurement of customer satisfaction helps to reveal changes in tastes and preferences by customers that can be used in developing products and services in order to retain existing customers and also attract new section of customers by factoring their preferences in business products or services. On the other hand, several customer measurement practices have been identified to work in various business sectors. To start with, transactional surveys have been widely used to gather information about customer satisfaction. This kind of approach is simple because it provides immediate feedback shortly after customer encounter (California Employers Association, n.d). Data collected through transactional survey may be regarded as qualitative because the kinds of responses obtained mainly include impressions of customers to general services and products relating to a particular business. Transactional surveys have advantages that can help businesses to measure customer service more effective. To start with, data from transactional surveys is obtained immediately after customer experience hence enabling the businesses to get actual responses as opposed to getting responses that taint impartial ‘picture’ of the business. For instance, customers can be asked to rate call center services immediately they have been served. However, some practices have to be exercised if businesses have to attain good results from transactional surveys. To begin with, transactional surveys can be effective if the number of questions included are few and require short answers. This is logical because many questions may demoralize the customers because of consuming significant amount of their time. In addition, questions that involve a lot of writing can cause customers to think a lot on how to answer the questions and instead of answering, they may opt to ignore the questions. Secondly, transactional surveys are effective when customers are informed of the estimated time that can be used to complete answering the questions. In most cases, the time consumed to answer the questions is usually short in order to point out to customers that only a small fraction of their precious time is consumed in answering the questions. This is arguably true because customers need their demands to be solved quickly and consuming much of their time can portray a negative image to them. Another method used in measurement of customer satisfaction is by conducting relationship surveys. Relationship surveys are types of surveys conducted to regular customers in a particular type of business (California Employers Association, n.d). This kind of survey is usually performed to customers with continued relationship with the business. According to the Business Research Lab, relationship surveys are performed when a business has customer contacts, a business serves the customers frequently with simple transactions and when a business considers the ongoing association with a customer to be important than a single transaction (2013). Therefore, relationship surveys involve a procedure where businesses contact customers with continued relationship in order to get feedback from them. Similarly, relationship surveys have to observe some practices that can lead to effective feedback from the customers. Like the transactional surveys, relationship surveys require that short questions that are simple to answer to be included in the survey. In addition, the survey should not demand long period of time for customers to answer the questions. In addition, it worth pointing out that in both types of surveys, the questions involved should be able to point out different aspects of the business that can be used to improve the quality of services and other products offered to the customers. Therefore, the best practices in measuring customer satisfaction require that surveys are conducted to establish general satisfaction of the customer, satisfaction attributed to the goods and services offered by the business and satisfaction associated to the benefits of purchasing business products. It is also worth noting that best practices used to measure customer satisfaction are tailored towards the type of customers, transactions and relationships that exists between different types of businesses and customers. Union Pay organization is a bank card association that was established under the approval of the State Council and the People’s Bank of China in 2002 (Union Pay International, n.d). Union Pay Organization has tried to incorporate various practices used to measure customer satisfaction. To start with, the Union Pay organization has developed a website page on which customers can contact the business at any location in the word through use of email, telephone and Fax. These methods of contacts are important in conducting transaction surveys to customers because it is easy to get immediate response from customers after offering receiving a service. In most transactions conducted by the organization, the customer service department requests customers to give feedback about the services offered to them. This means that the organization has met the expectations of best practices used in measurement of customer satisfaction using transaction surveys. In addition, the organization has initiated a corporate social responsibility where it offers credit card services to peasant workers. Through this approach, the organization has been able to survey customer satisfaction to partners with moderate income levels too. However, Union Pay organization has not effectively applied the practices of conducting relationship surveys. It is important for the organization to effectively apply practices in relationship surveys in order to be able to identify changes in tastes and preferences of customers with long term relationships. This is because tastes and preferences of customers vary with time in accordance to economic or social changes. For example, peasant workers can increase can increase their financial incomes by starting small businesses, which can develop over time hence requiring them to have a different financial plan in order to cater for their business needs. If Union Pay Organization does not recognize this gap, the workers may be forced to seek such services from other organizations that can cater their demands. In conclusion, best practices used to measure customer satisfaction should address customer needs from all aspects. From the above discussion, it is evident that questions used in the surveys should be simple to answer in order to reduce time spend by customers in answering them. In addition, it is evident that organizations should identify the type of relationships that exist between them and customers in order to formulate effective practices that can be used to measure customer satisfaction. Further, it is important for organizations to evaluate information obtained from the surveys in order to effectively implement changes that can match customer needs. References California Employers Association. (n.d). Best Practices in Customer Satisfaction Research. Retrieved from http://www.employers.org/files/resources/Best_Practices_in_Customer_Satisfaction_Research.docx Grigoroudis, E and Siskos, Y. (2010). Customer satisfaction evaluation: Methods for measuring and implementing service quality. New York: Springer. Hayes, B. E. (2008). Measuring Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty: Survey Design, Use, and Statistical Analysis Methods. Milwaukee, Wis: ASQ Quality Press. The Business Research Lab. (2013). Relationship Versus Transaction Measurement. Retrieved from http://www.busreslab.com/index.php/articles-and-stories/research-tips/customer-satisfaction/relationship-versus-transaction-measurement/ Union Pay International. (n.d). About Union Pay. Retrieved from http://en.unionpay.com/comInstr/aboutUs/list_aboutUs.html Read More