When you’re doing business without completing much customer research beforehand, a lot of assumptions are made. These can sometimes be way off because you’re not really asking your customers what they think, instead relying on preconceptions that are sometimes wrong. This is where Customer Thermometer comes in.
This handy little app allows you to send out emails that allow your customers to provide feedback in a quick and easy way and rate your service based on a traffic light system that represents how satisfied they are with the service or just about anything else you’d like feedback on. Read on to find out more.
Overview
Customer Thermometer works to make gathering feedback from customers simple, providing a straightforward method of measuring their satisfaction with a particular thing by inviting them to rate it based on a four-tier system: extremely satisfied, satisfied, indifferent and dissatisfied. Should the user provide the lowest rating, you are immediately notified to ensure that you are able to follow up the issue and provide support for that particular user. These statistics are presented in an easily-readable fashion, allowing you to quickly browse an overview of what your customers think.
Customer Thermometer's site
Pricing
As for pricing, the app employs the popular freemium pricing model, allowing users to use the app at no cost whatsoever. However, the free plan limits the number of “temperatures” (responses) that can be taken per month to 5. All plans, both free and premium, are fully-featured and users are only required to pay should they want to take more temperatures each month and the lowest one of these being $17 per month for 50 temperatures that can be taken, a worthwhile investment should you want to know exactly what your customers think. The remaining plan prices go up to $97 per month for 1,000 temperatures. Overall, if you’re serious about getting feedback from your customers to fine-tune your service, Customer Thermometer should be ideal for you.
Pricing
Getting Started
Customer Thermometer doesn’t ask for much information during registration – it simply asks for your email and chosen password before redirecting you directly to the app. Should you choose a premium account, you must enter payment details after this step. Then, when this is complete, you are sent straight to the dashboard.
Account Activation
This is where it gets interesting. To demonstrate what a thermometer looks like and how it works, the app requires users to activate their account through the use of a sample thermometer. Once a name and email address has been entered in the required format, it is then sent to the email address where you’ll be able to select any answer for the account to be activated. Though it’s clear that this is a novel introduction to the app, it’s a great way to demonstrate how each thermometer will look and introduce its users to the concept.
Dashboard
Creating ‘Thermometers’
The first process to sending out a thermometer is compiling the content of the email itself. This can either be done from scratch or created through one of the various provided templates that are useful for various circumstances. Using the thermometer creation tool, you are able to enter the question that you would like to ask the responder as well as the body of the email to explain why you are conducting the research.
Adding a New Thermometer
Various icon sets are available to include in the thermometer and can be chosen based on the level of formality required. Text can then be added to each as well as there being input boxes to supply the text displayed on the landing page shown after a user has chosen an answer. This process is extremely straightforward and each step is explained clearly.
Lists
These are exactly what they sound like and they comprise the recipients of the Customer Thermometer emails. The app makes it extremely easy to add users to a list in a simple “(email),(firstname),(surname)” format with each recipient occupying their own line or these can be imported from a CSV file just as easily. When the list has been saved, it can then be added to an email ready for sending.
Creating Lists
Sending ‘Blasts’
Customer Thermometer likes to call the emailed thermometers ‘blasts’ and to send one of these, it’s a simple three step process where you choose the thermometer you’d like to send, the recipients and you can optionally give the blast a name. You’re given a final chance to review the blast details and preview what it will look like before sending. The rest is handled by the users and they then receive the email and can act upon it.
Sending Blasts
Here’s an example blast your users will receive:
Blast Email
Should the user give the lowest rating, you will then be notified with their email address so you can immediately follow the issue up. This ensures that you can iron out the flaws in your services by contacting the affected users directly.
Red Light Notification Email
Analysing Feedback
Once you’ve gathered enough data to work with, you’ll be able to easily view this data to see just what your customers think. The main ‘Reporting’ page displays the data for all blasts to date and allows thermometers to be exported to a CSV format file for use with spreadsheet software. Response rates can also be viewed from here as well as a bar chart showing all blast responses based on the colour of light chosen. Another handy little feature is the ability to generate a report for a single user, showing their responses over time – a tool that comes in useful should you send out regular blasts.
Reporting Overview
The individual blast views also show the number of responses for each chosen answer as well as a virtual gauge showing the average response level from users. This data can too be exported for use with spreadsheet software, allowing integration into other research.
Individual Blast Report
Final Thoughts
All in all, I believe that Customer Thermometer is a really intriguing method of gathering customer feedback and I found no major flaws with the way it worked and collected the data. In addition to just detailing how to use specific features, the website itself also contained several articles and guides that show how to make the most of the app and ensure it is used to its full potential.
It could really turn out to be the Holy Grail for any business, big or small, that wants to take its research into customer satisfaction that extra mile, and is definitely worth checking out.