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Today's environment
requires both public and private sector executives to make significant
decisions in a timely manner, using the best market research information
available. Decision makers must have high returns on the information
provided. It is our aim at M. Davis and Company, Inc. to provide
government agency executives a product — high return on
information (ROInfo™) — that most effectively identifies
challenges facing their organizations and best solutions to those
challenges.
ROInfo™,
through the use of a range of research methods and techniques,
program designs and monitoring tools, provides clients with critical
information in real time. This timely presentation of critical
performance information improves executive decision making and
organizational performance.
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CASRO
and CMOR
CONGRATULATIONS
to Morris R. Davis, President and Founder of M. Davis and Company,
Inc. He was recently elected as a Board Member and Officer of
(1) The Council of American Survey
Research Organizations (CASRO), as well as co-chairing and playing
a lead role in (2) The Council for
Marketing and Opinion Research (CMOR) Task Force.
Officers
of the 2003 CASRO Board of Directors
2002 Secretary Morris R. Davis
(M. Davis and Company, Inc.), 2003 Board Chair Paul
A. Talmey (Talmey-Drake Research & Strategy,
Inc.), CASRO President Diane K.
Bowers, 2003 Treasurer Dale
S. Lersch (PERT Survey Research), and 2003 Chair-Elect
Simon Chadwick (NOP
World).
 (1)
The Council of American Survey Research Organizations (CASRO)
is the trade association of survey research businesses, representing
nearly 200 companies and research operations in the United States,
Canada, and Mexico.
CASRO works
to fully serve its members, the industry and the public. Our volunteer
committees are: Annual Conference, Benchmarking Best Practices,
CASRO University, Financial/Compensation/Internet Research Survey,
Global Liaison, Government and Legal Affairs, Guidelines and Practices,
Marketing and Communications, Membership Services, Past Chairs
Council, Publications, Standards, and Technology. We have sets
of guidelines that address business practices in general as well
as specific aspects of the survey research process, such as data
collection, data processing, and reporting survey results. For
most of our history, we have served as the watchdog for any proposed
changes in government regulations or legislation that could affect
the research industry. And, importantly, we are now working with
other industry associations to coordinate industry supported initiatives
in the areas of government affairs, respondent cooperation, assessing
client needs from research, education and training, and professional
and industry identity.
One major
common ground for all CASRO members is the belief in the value
and necessity of survey research in today's world. Whether it
is research standards, business ethics and practices or research
processes, CASRO mandates its members to respect the public's
rights to confidentiality and privacy as well as encourage its
members to offer their clients the highest quality of service,
and to grow their employees' skills and proficiencies. To find
out more about CASRO, please visit their website at: www.casro.org.
 (2)
CMOR was established as The Council for Marketing & Opinion
Research in 1992 by four major marketing and market & opinion
research trade associations:
American
Marketing Association (AMA)
Advertising Research Foundation (ARF)
Council of American Survey Research Organizations (CASRO)
Marketing Research Association (MRA)
These associations
have been joined by more than 150 corporations and organizations
that conduct and/or use marketing and opinion research. Together,
under the CMOR umbrella and leadership, we work to further the
acceptance of marketing and opinion research by the public and
the government, through education, lobbying, and providing legislative
support to prevent abuses of the research process.
CMOR also
designs and implements programs that help ensure improved access
to consumers, so that respondent awareness of the value of research
increases and respondent cooperation rates improve. To find out
more about CMOR, please visit their website at: www.cmor.org.
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Effective
Communication Improves Customer Service
Good communication
is the core of effective performance management and is key to
achieving customer satisfaction. Examples of good customer-focused
communication practices include:
- obtaining
feedback from customers on their needs and assessing their satisfaction
with organizational performance;
- informing
employees and customers of organizational goals; and
- providing
feedback on organizational performance to employees and customers.
The National
Partnership Council recognized several organizations for achieving
organizational goals through partnerships and through using effective
communication methods.
Overton
Brooks Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Center
Defense Contract Management Command (DCMC)
In particular,
these organizations:
- established
and communicated results-oriented, customer-focused measures;
and
- collected,
analyzed, published, and used customer feedback.
Overton
Brooks Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Center
The VA Center annually surveys its customers to track their satisfaction
with its medical services. The Center also communicates its objectives
and achievements with both internal and external customers via
newsletters, internal forums, and community outreach programs.
The Center uses partnership teams to plan and coordinate these
activities. As a result of these and other efforts, the Center
almost doubled the number of patients seen daily per provider,
reduced the number of bed days of care by 50 percent, and increased
follow-up care of mental health patients by 40 percent.
Defense
Contract Management Command (DCMC)
DCMC welcomes frequent and informal feedback from customers and
electronically posts its progress on performance objectives each
month for both internal and external customers to view. Using
a “post card trailer” to assess customer satisfaction,
DCMC focused on becoming a “whatever it takes” organization.
As a consequence, DCMC increased productivity, saved over $864,000,
and improved its customer satisfaction rating to 5.8 on a 6.0
scale. Their Labor Management Council supports these efforts to
become a “world class” customer service organization
even while facing a 20 percent reduction in manpower and a 100
percent increase in workload.
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 Customer
Satisfaction and Quality
What
is Quality?
The primary dimensions of product quality include:
- Performance
- Features
- Reliability
- Conformance
- Durability
- Serviceability
- Aesthetics
- Perceived
Quality
Increasingly,
however, service quality is attracting equal or more attention.
- Responsiveness
- Reliability
- Accuracy
- Knowledge
of Employees
- Courtesy
- Consistency
- Speed
These listed
dimensions of product and service quality are, in a broad sense,
generic to most situations. However, every business is unique,
and if customer satisfaction measurements are to be meaningful,
expectations should be phrased in the language of customers for
each distinct market segment.
Also, some
needs are more critical than others and it is wise to determine
the relative importance of each need. After measuring satisfaction
levels, emphasis can then be placed on improving performance in
areas important to the customer, but where the organization may
be lacking in comparison to the quality delivered by competitors.
Achieving
Continuous Quality Improvement
Continuous quality improvement begins by identifying customer
expectations for all key “moments of truth” —
the critical interactions customers have with the organization.
This can include contact with, for example, internal support groups,
collection individuals, sales representatives, management, or
direct service providers.
The best way
to understand customer expectations is to listen to customers
using qualitative research techniques. This usually requires skillful
probing by someone practiced in customer satisfaction measurement.
After identifying
expectations, customer satisfaction can readily be measured.
However, this
requires the customer to answer specific questions about how he
or she feels about the company’s performance. This is why
it is so important to capture their interest and build the credibility
needed to gain their cooperation. The task is made considerably
easier by speaking the customer’s language and presenting
only issues that are truly significant.
Why
Quality Must Be Measured
More and more, quality is being measured. Companies are coming
to the conclusion that if they can measure it, they can manage
it and, consequently, can improve it.
The best performing
organizations are allowing customer expectations to drive their
quality initiative. They recognize customers define quality by
judging them in relation to competitors.
Organizations
that constantly measure themselves in relation to competitors
(Benchmarking) are able to quickly capitalize on their emerging
strengths and address weaknesses before they become problems.
Why
Include Customers of Competitors
The rationale for including non-customer (customers of competitors)
benchmarking is that without the non-customer data customer satisfaction
levels are arbitrary. Both sets of data allow an organization
to exploit its strengths, and put initiatives in place to narrow
and eliminate any gaps between expectations and performance.
In fact, the
best performing organizations benchmark themselves against:
- Their
best competitor
- The industry
average
- A world
class supplier in a similar industry
Feature measurements
permit the organization to objectively assess how well the initiatives
are working.
How
Exit Interviews Can Translate into Huge Profit Increases
By measuring only customer satisfaction levels, organizations
miss former customers who have left-because they no longer had
the need for, or were unhappy with the products or services being
offered. Measuring customer retention, on the other hand, relates
directly to the bottom line. Long term customers spend more, refer
new clients and are less costly to do business with.
Ironically,
part customers present every company with an opportunity. They
can tell the organization exactly what parts of the business to
fix in order to reduce the number of customers at risk. This improves
customer retention and, subsequently, profitability.
An average
organization loses about 15% of its customers every year. But
if this can be reduced to 10%, bottom line profits improve 35%
to 85%.
Finding out
why customers leave can often be difficult since the majority
of unhappy customers don’t complain, they simply quit. Exit
interviews solve this problem.
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ABOUT
M. DAVIS AND COMPANY
M. Davis and
Company, Inc., is a market research and consulting firm that provides
complete services from project conception through implementation.
We aim to ensure that our clients receive a high return on information
(ROInfo™) by employing our unique perspective and market
insights. We help clients make the most of their opportunities
and implement solutions based on the information we provide.
M. Davis and
Company, Inc. was recently re-awarded a contract by the U.S.
Department of Transportation to continue administering
the Omnibus Household Survey. This multi-year
engagement involves the bi-monthly administration of over 1,000
telephone surveys to randomly selected households to gather information
regarding commuting habits and awareness of various Federal safety
initiatives. M. Davis and Company has been successful in raising
the Omnibus Household Survey participation rate from less
than 40% prior to July 2001 to over 50%
for December 2002.
In addition
to the U.S. Department of Transportation, other
recent engagements include:
- U.S.
Department of Housing and Urban Development
- We
are currently conducting a research study to identify predictors
of length of stay in HUD supported permanent housing for homeless
people with disabilities and post-departure residential histories
of those leaving permanent housing. Study methodology consisted
of both telephone and in-person interviews.
- Exxon-Mobil
- M. Davis
and Company, Inc. developed a tracking study to assess Exxon-Mobil’s
marketing success among African-Americans. The survey monitors
awareness, usage, attitudinal changes and customer satisfaction
among African-Americans in selected markets nationwide. Study
findings incorporated into revised strategic market plan.
- Denny’s
Inc.
- U.S.
Army Reserve
- Administered
a telephone survey to over 800 individuals to gain an understanding
of the profile, lifestyle and attitudes of men and women who
currently serve in U. S. Army reserve units.
- M.
Davis and Company has also been administering multi-year
“tracking” studies to measure advertising campaign
effectiveness for clients in the fuel services and hospitality
industries.
We believe
our clients are buying solutions, not volumes of data. To achieve
success, our clients need "added value" and we supply
it. We forge a close relationship with our clients, becoming their
trusted partner, instead of a supplier. With better understanding
of our clients, we narrow the gap between their objectives and
operations by providing information tailored to their needs and
designed to help them achieve: "high margin" information.
Our clients can then employ strategies and tactics that produce
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