Outsourcing your satisfaction survey: how does it work?

For companies, the opinion of their customers is more than necessary for the development of their activity. This is why more and more companies are carrying out satisfaction surveys which, as the name suggests, aim to measure customer satisfaction. In short, this consists of asking a large number of people to answer a series of targeted, clear and simple questions. This helps companies to build customer loyalty and it also allows them to be informed of the opinions and expectations of consumers on their products, services or brand, which is a good way for companies to learn about the issues and improvements to be planned for the development of their business.

Many companies decide to outsource their satisfaction surveys and justifiably so: there are many advantages. At a lower cost, expert teams in customer relations will take over the work for a quality result. In concrete terms, how is a satisfaction survey carried out when it is delegated to an external service provider? What is the work process? Bénédicte Bathurst, General Manager of the call centre ProContact explains the different steps to follow during the outsourcing of a satisfaction survey.

Creating and editing the questionnaire

Before launching the satisfaction survey, the prospect will tell the external service provider the problem and the objectives of the survey. Following which, together, they will create the questionnaire that will be distributed to the customer portfolio. “In general, the client writes the script of the campaign himself. They know exactly the questions they want to ask their customers and the information they want to get from them. We provide support. When we notice that the questionnaire is too long, not structured enough or that the questions are too heavy, we can suggest that the client reworks the script to make it more accessible”, explains the General Manager of ProContact. The client and the external service provider also define the communication channels through which the survey will be carried out (by telephone, email, etc.). The idea is to choose the most strategic ones. Once the questionnaire is validated and the teams know exactly what the client’s expectations are, the campaign can begin.

Carrying out the campaign

Highly qualified operators will then take note of the script and will call the customers targeted in the satisfaction survey. They will make the calls on behalf of the customer’s company. “A satisfaction survey always takes at least one month. This is the ideal time frame, because it gives us time to get used to the script, to become efficient and to have representative results regarding the information collected”, states Bénédicte Bathurst. The secret to making a satisfaction survey work? The General Manager is strictly says: “The script must not be too long. People are generally happy to answer questions and give their opinion, however, not for ten minutes”.

Good to know: Most external service providers have multilingual agents who are particularly useful in the context of a satisfaction survey: they make it possible to address a wider circle of customers and therefore to collect more opinions.

Processing and analysing the data

Once the satisfaction survey is completed, the teams ensure rapid processing of the data and will format the results to deliver to the client a complete document, ready for use. ‘We send the company an Excel file with all the answers collected. We often include percentages, statistics, pie charts or even histograms. It all depends on the information we have and the client’s expectations”, says Bénédicte Bathurst. These statistics are important for a company. Indeed, it will cross-analyze the results to draw conclusions, measure the quality of its actions and determine the areas of progress on which it will have to work.

Why outsource your satisfaction survey?

For a company, the advantages of outsourcing its satisfaction survey are multiple. First of all, it helps to free up time and to refocus on the heart of the business and on tasks with higher added value. In other words, it is ideal for a company that wants to take the time to develop its business. Secondly, outsourcing allows the company to considerably reduce its costs. Indeed, there is no need to invest money to create a customer service dedicated to satisfaction surveys. Finally, outsourcing is the ideal way to benefit from a quality work output. “To conduct a satisfaction survey, you need to be completely neutral. However, when a company decides to do this internally, without wanting to, there may be a lack of objectivity. Unintentionally, as soon as you are directly involved, you tend to re-orient the answer of the person you are talking to. That’s why it’s wiser to use an external service provider for this type of mission. When our teams are on the phone with clients, they never try to tip the balance one way or the other”, explains the General Manager.

Contact us!

Whether it is for web agencies, e-commerce sites, digital marketing specialists, start-ups, pure players, etc., outsourcing can be a difficult decision to make, but by entrusting needs to a reliable service provider recognized for the quality of its services, your company will gain a partner it can count on to develop and survive in a strong competitive context.

With several decades of presence in the industry, ProContact is more than a contact centre. Thanks to our trained, qualified, hand-picked and multilingual agents, we enable companies that choose us to gain flexibility and reduce their operating costs, which is currently important in the midst of an economic recession.

To find out more about our services, click on our contact form, send us an e-mail or call us on (+33) 1 84 76 24 03.