Without capturing their customer's voice, companies risk alienating customers, lowering customer satisfaction, and slowing financial growth. VOC is the critical first step.
Capturing the voice of the customer (VOC) entails listening to customers to develop an understanding of their needs and value drivers. Without capturing their customer's voice, companies risk alienating them, lowering customer satisfaction, and slowing financial growth. Undoubtedly, the first and most critical step in value creation for customers is to gather their voices.
Focus Groups & In-Depth Interviews
In a focus group, the company can bring together 5–15 consumers to discuss a specific topic. The discussion is led by a trained moderator who guides the conversations to reveal consumers' beliefs, attitudes, perceptions, and desires related to a product or service. In-depth interviews are very similar, except they are done in a one-on-one setting with a consumer.
Ethnography & Observation
Sometimes customers are unwilling or unable to verbally describe their experience. In such a case, companies observe customers in their naturalistic setting, in person or through technologies such as video recording or body and eye tracking sensors.
Online and Social Media Content
Online and social media content is one of the richest sources of customer voice. Consumers leave a large amount of content on websites, social media, and online forums in the form of reviews, social media posts, blogs, and videos.
Crowdsourcing
Companies like LEGO have developed large online user communities to obtain and refine ideas about product and service offerings. Platform participants become a source of ideas and critiques that enable a company to improve its offerings. Participants typically take pride in being part of the company's community and feel intellectually and emotionally rewarded when they see their ideas voted up.
Conclusion
A single company will use more than one customer voice technique. As an example, a successful retailer such as Walmart may conduct focus groups and in-depth interviews, observe customers shopping in its stores, mine online reviews and posts from customers, and crowdsource ideas from an online platform.