How Feedback Can Shape Better Data Solutions

Actionaut Shaun Davis’ “Analytics Advantage” is a weekly newsletter of actionable insights, proven strategies, and top tips for getting the most from your data and making high-stakes decisions with confidence. Here’s a sample issue. We hope you’ll subscribe.

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Without customers, you don’t have much of a business. But listening to them can be challenging.

They don’t understand the depth of thought you put into the marketing and product design. They’re always asking for a faster horse when you want to build them a Model A Ford.

But here’s the reality: They’re ultimately right.
How do you take the troves of data they provide and turn it into action?

Let’s see how you can listen to your customer feedback and then act.

Listening and Acting on Customer Feedback

Customer feedback comes to you through multiple channels:

• Support tickets
• Call transcripts
• Public reviews
• Surveys and panels

Even for a small company, this is a massive amount of data.

Few companies truly turn this data into action. Many boast about learning from customer data at conferences, but in reality, decisions are often more about gut feelings than data-driven insights. This is a huge opportunity for you and your team to stand out.

Why Customer Feedback is Your Advantage

Leveraging customer feedback to enhance sales, marketing, design, or operations shows that you’re an innovative leader who understands the drivers of change and revenue. It builds a reputation for data-informed decision-making, which boosts company stability.

Accept the Reality: There’s Too Much Data (And That’s Okay)

The first truth about customer feedback is that it’s overwhelming. But that doesn’t mean you or your team can ignore it.

Here are three approaches to go from data overload to actionable insights with customer feedback.

1. Seek to Be Proven Wrong

Years in your industry have taught you a lot about your customers’ thoughts, wants, and motivations. But assumptions can be limiting. Examine your data with the goal of disproving some of your long-held beliefs. You might be surprised at the insights waiting for you.

Customers aren’t just 1s and 0s; they’re complex and sometimes contradictory. Customer feedback data is an approximation of reality, shaped by the biases and limitations of how it’s collected. There’s an entire field of study dedicated to understanding and mitigating survey bias.

2. Tap into the Power of LLMs

Much of customer feedback arrives as text data. Large Language Models (LLMs) are excellent at transforming raw text into structured data that can feed into databases, models, and visualizations. This can take your analysis to the next level.

But be cautious. AI can “hallucinate” and fill in gaps with unreliable information. Approach this technology carefully, validating outputs to avoid costly errors.

3. Establish a Feedback-Driven Culture

After uncovering insights and perhaps challenging some of your assumptions, it’s time to lead. Set a standard for how, where, and how often your team taps into customer feedback. This may mean investing in surveys, new tools, or dedicated roles to maintain a competitive edge.

For a true “customer-centric approach,” feedback data must influence every team, not just Sales, Marketing, and Support. It needs to become part of your regular cadence in board, manager, and planning meetings. This data should be as central to your discussions as topline revenue.

The Bigger Picture

Data isn’t just there for fun or curiosity, it’s there to create products that drive lasting change. Find your passion again for solving difficult problems and easing the burdens of our overwhelmed lives. Data can help get you there.

‘Til next time.

Shaun Davis, your personal data therapist, understands your unique challenges and helps you navigate through the data maze. With keen insight, he discerns the signal from the noise, tenaciously finding the right solutions to guide you through the ever-growing data landscape. Shaun has partnered for 10 years with top data teams to turn their data into profitable and efficiency hunting action. Learn more about Shaun.