Check Out Our New White Paper: Strategies to Measure the ROI of a Voice of the Customer Programme

Measuring the financial gains of a programme can be a complicated mix of qualitative, quantitative and finding that some factors are ultimately immeasurable. While calculating the ROI of a VoC programme can be done, some major factors will impact how you go about it.

In this blog post, we set out some of the key considerations that must be taken into account when preparing to measure the ROI of your VoC programme. If you would like a more detailed and practical analysis please click HERE to download our white paper that outlines strategies on how to measure the ROI of a VoC programme. 

Short-term benefits may not exist

A VoC programme will not bring immediate gains to any company. Transforming customer experience and reaping the benefits from customer loyalty and retention can take as many as five years. Before measuring ROI it is important that senior management and executive understand that it will take time before a VoC initiative is profitable.

Align with your financial team

From the outset of your VoC programme, your financial team will be one of the most important stakeholders. They will be able to best understand how CX initiatives are bringing operational and financial value to your business, and they will connect your CX metrics to the financial metrics that will help determine ROI. Similarly to your IT team who will help to implement the programme, the financial team needs to be on-board for the entire process, so that they can understand and articulate the benefits of your initiative.

Consider your customer

The nature of your business and your customer base will determine how you measure the ROI of a VoC initiative. Do you have a loyalty programme? Do you have a chain of businesses? Is your business model B2B or B2C? Is it transactional or subscription-based? When calculating ROI, it is very important to control for the various factors that may have an impact on return frequency or retention, such as customer demographics and prior spending.

Create a bigger picture

It is impossible to measure the profits incurred from some of the benefits of a VoC programme, such as the soft benefits gained from isolating issues within a department or sharing insights across an organization. When reporting the ROI of your initiative to executives, you will have to supplement your results with additional information on the immeasurable gains incurred. These are important elements and should not be left out of the financial discussion. Consider changes to business processes or product development derived from comments left by your customers. Do not forget to account for these actions from the outset of your journey with your VoC programme.

Conclusion

All of these factors should be taken into consideration before you embark on measuring the benefits of your VoC programme. The process requires time and patience to ensure a higher rate of success. Insufficient planning can guarantee poorly persuaded executives and rocky implementation. Don’t forget to check out our White Paper to learn more. 

Let us know what you think – any feedback or comments are welcomed below!