An underrated aspect of being a business leader is the ability to listen. It means taking in and really considering the opinions of colleagues, advisers and peers. But listening to and finding ways to effectively incorporate feedback from customers can be tricky.
Michael Feuer, OfficeMax co-founder and a long-time contributor to this magazine — 20 years this year, to be exact — took an interesting approach to eliciting and acting on feedback from customers.
In an interview he did with TTEC for its Customer Strategist Journal, he says there’s a limit to the usefulness of customer feedback surveys and sentiment analysis tools. To get a better sense of what they really want, he went direct to the source. Feuer says he would make unannounced visits to his OfficeMax stores and go undercover — dressed casually rather than in a suit — to talk with customers as they were shopping.
Hanging out in the aisles, he says he would ask customers what they thought of certain products. If they made a good suggestion, he would implement it. He learned, for instance, that many people returned equipment because they didn’t know it needed additional parts such as software or batteries. Feuer took that problem back to his team and their solution was to include a checklist of everything needed for that item. The change, he says, saved the company millions of dollars.
Feuer would also answer customer service calls on occasion using an alias — that he was an assistant or a technician who would pass the messages to the CEO. He says he took the approach because sometimes people get flustered when they’re talking to the CEO, but are more likely to say what they really think when they’re just talking to an employee.
There are lots of ways to get customer feedback. In today’s digital world, comments and reviews can provide information about customer sentiment. Analytics and data can be gleaned from anything that touches the web, helping to inform a company about what’s working and what’s not. But, as is illustrated through Feuer’s example, sometimes going direct to the source can offer valuable insights. As Feuer puts it: “Some CEOs think this is beneath them, but there’s a lot you can learn by stepping out of the office or your role and simply speaking with your customers.” ●
Fred Koury is President and CEO of Smart Business Network Inc.
