An Introduction to Voice of the Customer (VOC)

VOC stands for the Voice of the Customer, method of identifying customer requirements and prioritizing them in terms of relative importance to the customer. Some common methods of capturing VOC are market research, focus groups, surveys, verbal communication, e -mails, service agreement documents, and data reports. These methods may be helpful in capturing information and some expectations, but they are not enough to drive improvement activity.

Do we really understand where the information is sourced, how it is gathered, and what the information is really telling us? Moreover, do we really understand why the voice of the customer is important?

Simply put, if we fail to meet our customer’s requirement the impact could be significant. It could mean poor or lower quality, incorrect quantities, inadequate lead times, customers moving to other suppliers to fulfill their needs. VOC is not merely about identifying customer necessities, it is about “listening” to the voice of the customer.

Capturing the Voice of the customer can be attained in a variety of ways from customer surveys, interviews, marketing research, audits, focus groups, service issues, quality issues, customer complaints etc. The important thing is not just offer a communication channel to the customer, but to take an active interest in the customer opinions too. A customer need is the customer requirement in their own words. At times what we identify, as the customer need isn’t the same thing that the customer expects.

Research attests that the majority dissatisfied customers don’t even complain. While most of them simply choose to never return to your business, it is only the really irritated clients, who take it upon themselves to make their opinions known. When that happens having a functional VOC system in place provides one last chance to even win those enraged customers trust back.

Feel free to contact me directly to discuss how you might improve your efforts to capture voice of the customer (VOC).