Interior Door Replacement Co., a $10 million franchise with 17 locationsin California, Arizona, and Texas, sends its survey with a thank-you letterand a return envelope two days after job completion. The survey consistsof four short sections covering initial office contact, in-home consultation, removalof existing doors, and new product installation. Each sectionhas three to five short questions — “Did the in-home consultantarrive on time?” “Did the door pick-up team clean up afterthe job?”— and lets clients give answers on a 1-to-10 scale. Atthe bottom of the form, there’s blank space for customers to writetheir comments. For example, on a recent survey completed at IDRC’s Torrance, Calif., franchise, ahappy customer wrote, “I love the new doorsand knobs. They give my house a new and beautiful look. Thank you!”
While those kinds of comments are useful for IDRC’s future business, the survey’sstructured, segmented format helps identify and isolate any issues orparts of the job that didn’t go right.
“Since we divided the survey into the four areas of our business, youcan really pinpoint where problems are,” says Pat Saign, IDRC’s directorof marketing and franchise development. “It helps us with trainingbecause if one of our franchisees has an office score of 9.9, but the doorpickup team is consistently scoring 7.4, we need to look at what’s goingon there.” Surveys are reviewed at weekly staff meetings, with high scoresacknowledged companywide, and low scores addressed case by case. “It’sthe old saying of praising in public and admonishing in private,” Saignsays.
Response Rate To ensure a meaningful response rate from its clients, IDRC follows up witha telephone call to thank customers again and to gently remind them to returnthe questionnaire. This helps the company achieve about a 25% response rate. (Bailey, thecustomer service expert, says a response rate of 10% or morefor mailed surveys is good.) Besides identifying problem areas, such assticking doors or jambs, which can be immediately addressed, the phone callsgather any referrals for new business that a customer might be able to provide.
“More than 75% of the time, if we call and the customer says, ‘Oh, Ijust love my doors,’ we just let them talk,” Saign says. “Thenwe ask if they’ve had a chance to share their new doors with neighborsand friends. When they say ‘yes,’ we ask if we can get some names andaddresses.”
Saign says the cost of the program is nominal, amounting to just the paper andpostage needed to mail the surveys.
While IDRC has found success with its surveys through traditional mail, Archadeck, adecking franchisor in Richmond, Va., with more than 85 locations nationally, saysit is busy converting the 2,000-plus surveys it sends to itscustomers each year into electronic format. “Our response rate is approaching 50% forour electronic surveys,” says Judy Yeargan, who managesthe surveying process in Archadeck’s marketing department. Yeargan e-mailsthe survey three times to Archadeck customers. Still no response? Shethen mails them a survey form. Roughly one third of mailed surveys comeback, she says, “which tells me that it’s worth it to go ahead andsend customers a hard copy, even if they ignored the e-mail.”
You can considerably boost your response rate by letting customers know, throughoutthe job, that they can expect a survey after completion. For instance, Polifkaattributes Vision Remodeling’s 85% response rate to its telephonesurvey to the fact that customers are reminded throughout the process toexpect a call afterward. “We’ve explained to them what the follow-upprocesses are, and we touch them a couple of times throughout the job to letthem know what’s going on,” Polifka says. “They kind of expectit by the time it comes.”
At S&K Roofing, Siding & Windows, co-owner and CFO Maija Kropp saysthe $15 million company walks a fine line to elicit responses from itscustomers without going overboard. In addition to calling, Kropp says, “it’sin our proposals, our e-mail newsletters, and even on our hold message. Bythe end of the job, the customer is aware that we want to know howtheir experience was.”
S&K conducts its surveys solely over the Internet, on a dedicated page ofthe company Web site. The form is brief and, combined with e-mail messagesthat she receives directly, Kropp says her response rate is around 50%. S&Kuses the results to better manage its employees and subcontractors bygoing straight to where it counts: their paychecks. Positive reviews on ajob spur a $25 bonus per employee. Negative responses mean a $50 paycut. “That $50 backcharge has a trickle-down effect,” Kroppsays. “Our managers and the other guys on the crew willgo to that individual to make sure they stay on their toes.”
To entice customers to respond, Kropp says S&K offers $10 off theinvoice, or will let clients choose to have that $10 donated to oneof several charities.
Other companies use incentives and send along extras as well, both to encouragefeedback and to ensure customer satisfaction throughout a job. At IDRC, surveyrespondents receive a year’s subscription to Sunset magazine, branded with the company’s logo each month to keep the firm’s namein front of customers.
At Harrell Remodeling in Mountain View, having a handle on what the company’scustomers think — and are saying to others about its business — isparamount not only to continuing to improve and grow, but ultimatelyto helping the business survive. “It’s important to realize that everybusiness is on a stage today,” Harrell says. “It’s not just aboutyour technical abilities, it’s about your public relations abilities aswell. That’s what customer feedback and satisfaction are all about, becausewith the information that’s available to them today, customers are demandingbetter service. Companies that don’t hear that message and respond aregoing to die.” —Joe Bousquin is a freelance writer based in California.