What is voice of customer?

In an increasingly customer-centric marketing world, voice of customer (VOC) has become a fundamental concept, but what exactly does voice of customer mean and how important is it for the business strategy of many companies?

While you will find a more detailed answer to these questions in our Degree in Marketing in Madrid or our Degree in Marketing in Valencia, we have prepared this article to give you the basics, such as what voice of customer is, when companies use this process and how to implement one successfully, and what its advantages are.

What does voice of the customer mean?

Voice of customer (VOC) is a strategic approach based on constant listening to consumers. This process is carried out by some companies to collect and analyse the opinions, needs, desires and expectations of customers about their products or services. The objective: to optimise their actions and adapt their offer to better satisfy the brand's users.

When is voice of customer used?

Generally, companies use the voice of the customer process in different situations, for example:

• Development of new products and services: before designing a product or service, it is important to understand what customers want. To do this, research techniques are available to help gather user opinions and needs and, as a result, brands can develop products that meet these requests.
• Continuous improvement: by collecting customer feedback, companies can identify areas where improvements to existing products and services are needed and adjust accordingly.
• Quality and customer satisfaction: some brands use voice of customer to assess the quality of a product or service as perceived by users and, in the process, measure their level of satisfaction.
• Strategic decision making: the voice of the customer is a tool that can help define marketing strategies, product development or even market expansion, among many others.
• Crisis management and problem solving: in crisis situations or when problems arise with a product or service, companies use the voice of the customer to understand the magnitude of the conflict and take appropriate action.
• Designing more effective customer experiences: this would include all those points of the customer journey map that involve interaction between customers and the brand, such as the way in which the service is offered to the user, navigation on the website or the design of applications.

Phases of a voice of customer programme

A good voice of customer programme can help a company to know exactly what current and potential customers think about its products or services, ensure that these are aligned with their needs or requirements and, consequently, achieve success in today's competitive market.

It is therefore important to create a voice of the customer programme that works. While there may be variations, this process often consists of the following phases:

Planning and goal setting

In this stage, the objectives of the voice of the customer programme are clearly defined (benchmarking, continuous improvement, user retention...) and the metrics that will be used to measure the success of the programme are identified.

Data collection

During this phase, the tools and techniques to be used to gather customer feedback are determined. Some of the most common are:

• Online, telephone or printed satisfaction surveys.
• Comments on websites, blogs, social media and other media.
• Reviews on customer feedback platforms.
• Individual or group interviews.
• Call logs, emails and customer service chat.
• Mystery shopping programmes.
• Net Promoter Score (NPS).

Data analysis

Here brands stop to analyse and process all the information they have collected to identify patterns, trends and common problems. This allows them to organise users into segments with similar characteristics and create detailed customer profiles. This is very useful for designing specific strategies.

Prioritisation of actions

Once the data analysis is done, it is time to develop an action plan to address priority areas for improvement, provide solutions to problems and improve the customer experience.

Disseminating results

The next step is to talk to the teams involved in the project and share the findings with the voice of the customer programme and act on them. But not before checking if the results are aligned with the business objectives and strategy.

Implementing the changes

Now it is time to implement the agreed strategies to solve the identified problems. If all goes well, these actions should contribute to improving the customer experience.

Monitoring and continuous improvement

It is important to continue to measure and monitor metrics to assess whether the actions that have been implemented are effective or, if not, some further adjustments to the strategy would be needed to meet customer requests.

The benefits of voice of customer

Implementing a voice of customer programme offers several advantages for companies, helping them to:

• Stay on top of customer satisfaction.
• Reduce churn and build customer loyalty, resulting in more stable revenue over time.
• Increase the customer base through recommendations made by users who are happy with the brand.
• Identify problems early, before they escalate or negatively affect large numbers of customers.
• Take action based on data rather than guesswork.
• Develop a competitive advantage in the marketplace by offering products and services in tune with customer desires.
• Measure the impact of actions taken.
• Develop products and services that are innovative and responsive to market demands.
• Reduce costs. By designing and producing products and/or services that are in line with what the consumer wants, you avoid wasting large amounts of resources.

Would you like to learn more about the voice of the customer process? Would you like to learn about this, and other topics related to the world of marketing? Check out our academic offer, at Universidad Europea we have numerous masters in Communication and Marketing and degrees in Communication and Marketing, which are taught both in distance learning and face-to-face format in Madrid, Valencia, Alicante and the Canary Islands. Find the programme best suited to your profile!