SMS surveying extends customer reach

Johannesburg, 24 Aug 2009

With business becoming more competitive, ensuring service quality and meeting customer needs are priorities, especially in the downturn when customer retention is paramount, states Kgabo Badimo, MD of Spescom DataVoice.

Discussing the business benefits of the recently unveiled Qnique SMS-based research service from DataVoice, Badimo says the service will give contact centre researchers quick access to the opinions of massive numbers of people.

SMS-based research entails sending out a single, well-designed question to a defined database. Based on the response, a second SMS can be sent to customers, either thanking them for their participation, promising further action or contact from a call centre agent, or providing a resolution to the query, states the company.

Spescom explains that a key differentiator of the Qnique SMS research service is that it integrates customer responses directly into a quality management solution, enabling fast identification and resolution of challenges, be they agent performance or client-related issues.

Commenting on the reach of the SMS research service, Badimo says, “SMS-based research is fast - more than 2 000 people can be surveyed a minute. Volumes are not limiting factors in terms of cost, bias is eliminated, responses are real- time and SMSes can be personalised.

“In addition, because SA has a very active SMS culture, response rates are high, up to 40%, as opposed to 10% with traditional telephonic methods. This makes this channel most productive from a research perspective.”

The strategic value of the service is the power to manage customer satisfaction and agent ratings in real-time, states Badimo. “This enables organisations to instantly review the collected information and, together with the data within the quality management solution, allow the organisation to better address any client issues as well as define and correct agent performance problems,” he continues.

“The advantages of SMS-based research are its immediacy and the fact that agent or business personnel responses, and thus expenditure of costly telephonic or scarce human resources, can be targeted,” he concludes.