Unleash the Hidden Gems of Qualitative Feedback for CX Transformation

Qualitative feedback provides exceptional customer insights for better business decision-making as it focuses on the subjective experiences, attitudes, and opinions of individual customers. So, investing efforts into gaining feedback works wonders, however, most businesses cannot make the best use of qualitative feedback because –

• They have a hard time figuring out what customers are really saying

• Collecting and analyzing feedback data takes up too much time 

• Biases and limited actionable insights may hinder their ability to make meaningful improvements

Customer experience platforms can help you turn your open-ended feedback into valuable insights. If you are unable to make the best use of qualitative feedback, here is a video to guide you through the process. 

Read on for more insights into leveraging qualitative feedback.

A Deep Dive into the Needs of Customers Using Qualitative Feedback

Open-ended feedback, often known as qualitative feedback, is a sort of feedback that tries to capture consumers’ personal experiences, views, and attitudes. This feedback can be gathered through a variety of approaches, including focus groups, interviews, questionnaires, and social media listening. It can assist firms in comprehending the “why” underlying consumer behaviors and choices, which is frequently more important than numerical information alone.

Consider a retail corporation that obtains quantifiable data from a customer satisfaction survey indicating low ratings in one of its stores. This data alone does not explain why customers are unhappy. By doing follow-up conversations with these clients, the organization will be able to obtain textual feedback that identifies specific pain concerns, such as extended wait times.

Likewise, if a bank receives grievances about the user interface of its website, it can collect consumer input via usability testing, which can provide a comprehensive understanding of why users are having difficulty navigating the site. This information can be utilized to boost the customer experience and improve satisfaction.

Textual feedback, while rich in information about client requirements and preferences, may be challenging to read and analyze. 

Business Challenges When Analysing Unstructured Qualitative Customer Feedback

Lack of perspective

Without context, it’s difficult to evaluate customer input in an unstructured written format. Businesses may hear that something is “bad,” yet without additional details, they may not know what exactly needs to be improved.

Small sample size

Open-ended comments frequently have a small sample size, making it challenging to arrive at inferences or discover trends. For example, a company may hold a focus group with only five people, who might not be indicative of the entire customer base.

Time-consuming

Collecting and analyzing such remarks can be time-consuming. This is especially true when companies use traditional approaches like in-person focus groups or individual interviews.

Prejudices

Written input from consumers can be subject to prejudices from both the customers who provide feedback and the people who analyze it. A customer, for example, may have a favorable leaning toward a specific brand, or a researcher may read input in a manner that confirms their own previous beliefs.

Minimal actionable insights

Considering the quantity of information provided by such customer inputs, organizations may fail to transform the data into actionable insights. This could be due to a shortage of resources or data analytic expertise.

Now that we’ve recognized some of the problems that businesses have, let’s look at how they might be addressed.

Platforms for Customer Experience Analysis of Unstructured Customer Comments

Customer experience tools are systems that allow businesses to collect, analyze, and act on input from customers. To make sense of vast amounts of qualitative feedback data, these platforms employ complex technology like natural language processing and analysis of sentiment. 

Here’s how these systems can assist organizations with qualitative feedback analysis.

Improved data collection

Because feedback from consumers can be collected on a broad scale, firms can gain information from a larger sample size. This can assist firms in identifying patterns and trends in client feedback, which can help them make strategic decisions.

Automated analysis

CX solutions can assist firms in automating feedback analysis, decreasing the amount of effort and resources necessary for manual analysis. Customer experience platforms, which use natural language processing and analysis of sentiment, can assist firms in swiftly identifying key themes and feelings in customer feedback.

Real-time Insights

Real-time information from customer opinions enable firms to respond rapidly to their problems by implementing necessary changes. This can assist firms in increasing customer contentment and loyalty.

Personalized experiences

Businesses can develop more personalized experiences for consumers by harnessing the information gathered from customer feedback. A retail corporation, for example, may use customer feedback to personalize product offerings for particular customer segments, thus enhancing the customer experience and boosting revenue.

Strategic advantage

CX solutions can provide a competitive edge to firms by helping them to keep ahead of developments and respond rapidly to alterations in customer preferences. This can help firms retain and attract new customers.

Better ROI

By transforming consumer feedback into actionable information, organizations may make better choices that result in a higher return on investment. For instance, an automobile manufacturer may use comments to guide the aesthetic of a new car model, leading to improved sales and revenue.

Businesses can find areas for improvement while making data-driven choices that enhance the overall customer experience by analyzing qualitative feedback. They should take a disciplined approach to feedback collecting and analysis in order to get maximum value out of customer experience platforms, and then use the insights acquired to drive significant change. 

If you are interested in more insights on making sense of unstructured qualitative feedback, we invite you to attend our upcoming webinar, ‘Bridging the insight gap from CX touchpoints to brand health and sales.’ Register now to gain valuable insights and actionable tips.