How Surveys Influence Customers

How Surveys Influence Customers - HBR

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How Surveys Influence Customers

by Paul M. Dholakia and Vicki G. Morwitz

FROM THE MAY 2002 ISSUE

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the study.

arketers have long appreciated that surveys engage people; a single yes-or-no question on a direct-mail envelope can induce them to look inside. But can a company survey influence customers’ loyalty or buying habits? Research over the past two decades has shown that it can, but the studies have been narrow—looking at how surveys affect attitudes in the short term or influence one-time

behavior, like a single purchase. We set out to study the scope of this survey effect, and we were astonished by what we found.

We conducted a field experiment with over 2,000 customers enrolled in the customer relationship program of a large U.S. financial services company. One randomly selected group of 945 people participated in a single, ten- to 12-minute telephone survey investigating customer satisfaction. During the call, they were asked to rate various features of the program, like estate planning, account monitoring, and retirement planning. At the call’s end, they were asked to rate their overall satisfaction with the company; most said they were highly satisfied. A second group of 1,064 randomly selected customers wasn’t surveyed and served as the control. We tracked these two groups for a full year, measuring their purchasing behavior, defection rates, and profitability. Neither group received any direct marketing from the company for the duration of

A year after the survey was conducted, the customers we surveyed were more than three times as likely to have opened new accounts, were less than half as likely to have defected, and were more profitable than the customers who hadn’t been surveyed. These differences reached their maximum levels several months after the survey was done and persisted throughout the year. Even at...