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Spending on Voice of the Customer Programs Increases Significantly

October 29, 2013

Voice of the Customer or “VoC” is the in-depth process of capturing a customer’s expectations, preferences and aversions it also produces a detailed set of customer wants and needs that are organized into a hierarchical structure and prioritized in terms of relative importance and satisfaction with current alternatives.


New research from Temkin Group reveals that there is significant increase in spending on Voice of the Customer programs. An overwhelming number of companies also reported that VoC programs delivered positive results while only 7 percent of big firms reported poor results from VoC programs.  The results were based on a survey of more than 180 large companies that have implemented VoC programs formally.

The results were compared to similar studies held in 2011 and 2012.  Mobile and analytics play a significant role in transforming VoC programs. The number of companies soliciting feedback via mobile phones has more than doubled from nine percent last year to 20 percent this year and is poised to continue rising.

"Taking action based on customer insights has enormous ROI," said Bruce Temkin, managing partner of Temkin Group. "Most companies are only scratching the surface on the potential value of these efforts. Future VoC efforts will look completely different than they do today." Across all areas examined in the study, more companies plan to increase rather than decrease their investments in VoC.

The most spending momentum is with Customer Insight & Action Platforms and text analytics. In both of these areas, more than 40 percent of firms plan to increase spending while less than 6 percent are planning a decrease. Considering the growth of VoC programs in organizations, companies are also expanding staffing. The research indicates that 36 percent of companies have more than five full-time employees dedicated to their VoC efforts, up from 31 percent last year. Sixty percent have three or more employees, which is an increase from 52 percent in 2012.

VoC programs have evolved through five levels of maturity, says Temkin Group. They have moved from "Novices" through to "Transformers." Only 20 percent of firms have reached one of the two highest levels of maturity in this year's study, but this represents an increase from 16 percent last year.




Edited by Stefania Viscusi



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