April 30, 2020

3 tips for monitoring client relationships

Lockdown and remote working has led firms to adopt a digital-first approach to monitoring client relationships.

The question that forward-looking firms are asking now, is how can we use technology for monitoring client relationships and finding new business opportunities?

To keep your finger on the pulse, you need to revisit how you monitor client relationships by changing how you track client and employee experiences. Ask open questions that reflect the current situation, and start aggregating all your sources of feedback in one place.

Lockdown and remote working has led firms to adopt a digital-first approach to monitoring client relationships

When clients and employees started working remotely, the initial focus was on tech for managing communications – Zoom, Teams, Slack etc. Now the focus is shifting. The question that forward-looking firms are asking now, is how can we use technology for monitoring client relationships and finding new business opportunities? When you’re no longer in the same office, or meeting people face-to-face, how do you pick up on relationship cues?

How do you know if this new way of working, is working?

To get the answer, you need to change how you listen:


3 tips for monitoring client relationships digitally

1) Review the questions in your current surveys.

Are you asking generic questions about needs and service, or are you showing empathy for the current situation?

2) Ask open questions.

Closed questions are even riskier in “unprecedented times”, as multiple-choice options are based on assumptions about what respondents want to say. Instead, ask open questions and give clients and employees room to tell you about their changing needs and expectations.

3) Look beyond surveys.

Feedback comes in many flavours. Clients will be sharing their needs & expectations in emails, text messages, phone calls and video chats. This feedback is gold, but only if it gets consistently captured and aggregated.

You can get started with a shared spreadsheet. Or maybe your MI system can aggregate all the feedback about remote service and new revenue opportunities. To speed up your decision-making, modern technologies like MyCustomerLens will automate this process for you.

In summary

Client and employee experiences are two sides of the same coin. Both experiences have significantly changed, leaving most of your feedback sources out of date.

To keep your finger on the pulse, you need to revisit how you monitor client relationships by changing how you track client and employee experiences. Ask open questions that reflect the current situation, and start aggregating all your sources of feedback in one place. This is not about replacing face-to-face meetings with surveys, it’s about making it easy for clients to share feedback when they have something to say.

Does this all seem good in principle, but impractical with your existing manual processes?

MyCustomerLens was developed to automatically collect all your business feedback in one place and then summarise the text comments in real-time. Get in touch, we can help you make faster and more informed decisions.

Time for a chat, or prefer to keep informed?

Is your firm ready to implement always-on client listening?
With a quick video call, we can help you decide.

Alternatively, keep up to date with Outside-in, the newsletter for client-centred professional services firms.

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