The survey says…

There’s no reason for service to fear CSI surveys if they are handled correctly

How a manager reacts to surveys plays a huge role in determining the overall culture of customer satisfaction in our service department. 

Let’s say ten good surveys come in along with one bad one. Watch how your team reacts to these surveys. 

Do they focus on the one bad one? Is their sole focus when they log in to look at surveys to seek out the negative ones? How do you as a manager react? Teach your team to focus on the ten good surveys and read the customer comments. 

This should happen first thing in the morning to get the advisors feeling good about themselves and reminding them that they are good at their job and a majority of your customers are extremely happy with the service you provide.

Who should call negative surveys? Normally what we see at dealerships is a service manager coming out of their office with the negative survey in hand. They aren’t happy and are demanding an answer from the advisor. 

The service manager then asks the advisor to call the customer to find out why they filled out the survey the way they did. This makes ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE at all! 

Why would you have the advisor, who already knows what happened and couldn’t solve it the day of the appointment, call this customer? 

ALL negative surveys should be called by the service manager. If you truly care about your customers, stop loading your gun before you make the call. 

If you prepare yourself for the call by asking everyone on your team what happened, you are loading your gun to respond with every reason you think you are right. 

Now we have an argument that will probably not have the desired result. Instead, call your customer first and listen with an open mind. You don’t have to solve the problem on the first call. By doing it this way you have the ability to end the call with “okay let me look into this and I will call you back.” 

The other advantage going into the conversation with an empty gun is that it makes you a better listener, and normally that’s all your customer needs. 

Protect your team! Service advisors have a tough job; they hear plenty of negativity all day. Let the advisors know that you will be dealing with all negative surveys and you want them to focus on celebrating the good ones. 

There will still be tough conversations to be had with the advisors, but now those can be behind closed doors. Remember praise in public, discipline behind closed doors.

Change your delivery: own the survey

Why do we introduce the survey at the end of the day? Go ask your advisors how they like begging for a survey at the end of the day during customer pick up. They HATE IT. 

Better yet, they don’t do it at all. You can’t blame them, you are constantly putting them in a position they don’t want to be in. Grab a coffee, sit in service and listen to how awkward these conversations are. 

By the way, the customers also hate the begging. How does a service advisor have this conversation if they know there was a problem? Instead, introduce the survey at vehicle drop off. Own it! 

“You will be receiving a customer satisfaction survey after your visit today that is very important to ME. If for any reason I didn’t meet or exceed your expectations could you please let me know today so I can rectify your concern?” 

Call your customer first and listen with an open mind. You don’t have to solve the problem on the first call. By doing it this way you have the ability to end the call with “okay let me look into this and I will call you back.”

We are not coaching; we are simply letting the customer know that their satisfaction is important. The service advisor now has a very easy conversation at the end of the day with a genuine “how did we do today?” and a reminder to expect the survey. 

Owning the survey at the beginning makes it much easier for the customer and the advisor.

Increase the number of surveys

We hear it all the time: “Only unhappy customers fill out surveys.” 

The truth is, it’s not that hard to increase the amount of good surveys. Now that we have the advisors protected from calling the negative surveys, let’s keep it positive. 

Your advisors should reach out to every good survey and thank them for taking the time to fill out the survey. “Just wanted to take a moment and thank you for the positive survey response, the surveys mean a lot to ME. If there is a point in the future where you don’t feel this way, please reach out to me.” 

Two things will happen. The first is a wonderfully positive conversation between your customer and your advisor. The second is that the next time the customer gets the email with another survey request they are more likely to fill it out in a positive way because of this phone call. 

We are also opening the lines of communication so that an unhappy customer will reach out to you before completing the survey.

Analyze your attitude towards customer satisfaction, stay positive and celebrate success. 

Leave your gun unloaded and listen to your customer. Change the way you deliver your message to the customer and OWN IT!

Related Articles
Share via
Copy link