The odds are your company is measuring all types of KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). From Inventory Churn, Market Share, Conversion, Daily Sales, Gross Revenue and a host of others, you measure every metric in the book. What may be missing is understanding the Voice of the Customer.
Paul Kirwin talks briefly about two company KPIs that are traditionally missing in most businesses. These are critical to understanding not only the Voice of the Consumer but how a product is actually doing:
- Product Review Volume
- Product Sentiment Average (Star Average)
In the chart above we have mapped out six months of product review volume. The black line is the total number of reviews. The green line is the number of positive reviews. The red line is the number of negative reviews.
Why is Review Volume Important?
There is a critical mass in the number of reviews when a consumer feels comforted by the review sentiment (discussed below). When the volume is too low, most consumers don’t trust the reviews. Especially when they are all 5 stars.
The above chart shows a typical sentiment average over a six month period. The sentiment, also known as the star average, is critical in understanding the voice of the consumer. Along with the actual comments about the product, the sentiment average displays how well the product met the expectations of the consumer.
Comparing the two charts is why this KPI is critical for the success of any product. As one will see, product review volume for this brand in July has gone up. The review sentiment has gone down. This is where our companies say, “Okay, we have a problem.” Now action is required. This product can be sent to product development to fix the problems.
If the sentiment is going up and review volume is going up the sales team can be brought into the conversation to help bolster the sales of that particular product. Marketing teams are easily able to take the direct words from their current customers and use them to help promote the products that are doing well.
Measuring and understanding these two critical KPIs, Review Volume and Sentiment Average are critical. Review monitoring with Channel Signal allows our customers to look at both and drill down to the root causes.