The Value of Constructive Client Criticism

I, as with most people, love to be told that I am performing well. It makes me feel good and builds my self esteem. The problem is that positive feedback doesn’t tell me what I need to fix. It is the same with business. If your clients are constantly telling you how wonderful you are, but not giving you any constructive criticism then one of two things is happening. Either your firm is perfect and needs to keep doing everything the same or you are not asking the right questions.

One thing we try to do with our clients is to make sure they have plenty of opportunities to both tell us what we do right and what they want changed. We have feedback surveys we ask them to fill out, have an advisory board of current clients, and take the time to call clients on a regular basis to see if we are meeting their expectations. We have worked hard at learning what issues our clients have with our services and then find ways to improve the quality of service. We take feedback very seriously and want our clients to understand that we listen to their concerns and will address them.

Don’t take your client feedback for granted or lump it all together with surveys and satisfaction ratings. They won’t tell you the whole story. Ask specific questions to your clients about how they feel. Then build a plan to address concerns and deal with them immediately. This will help to build trust with your clients. Remember, it is much harder to obtain a new client than to keep a current one. So work hard to keep the service high and listen when they provide criticism.