Organisations have access to more customer feedback than ever before. So why does so little change?
Surveys, interviews, reviews and complaints provide a constant flow of insight. Yet many Voice of the Customer (VoC) and Customer Experience (CX) programmes struggle to create meaningful change within the organisation. This is largely because VoC and CX are often treated as separate initiatives. VoC programmes focus on gathering and analysing customer feedback, while CX programmes focus on improving the customer journey. Both are valuable, but neither can reach its full potential alone.
Bringing VoC and CX together
VoC identifies where opportunities and problems exist; CX provides the framework for responding to them. Operationalising both means embedding a cycle of listening, learning and improving into everyday business processes. However, this remains a challenge. KPMG found that nearly half of VoC and CX leaders rate the maturity of their own programmes as “low” or “very low”.
Four common challenges
Many organisations encounter similar barriers when trying to operationalise VoC and CX programmes.
1. Customer insight is department-centric
Direct customer feedback is often held within the research or CX teams, while other departments only see the reports. Without shared ownership, valuable insights fail to influence product development, operations or strategy.
2. CX is seen as someone else's responsibility
Marketing sets expectations, sales influences early interactions, and operations shape service delivery, but CX is often viewed as a specialist function rather than a shared one, so opportunities for improvement are missed.
3. Too much information, not enough direction
Organisations have access to more customer data than ever before. Journey maps and metrics can provide visibility, but without context they often create information overload. A dashboard tracking ten different metrics, a monthly report that is skimmed, and a document of verbatim comments all sitting in different places don’t create a clear picture.
4. Feedback doesn't translate into action
Many organisations are excellent at collecting customer feedback but fail to show how it drives change. Medallia found that 66% of brands believe that CX is improving, but only 17% of customers agree.
Without ownership and actions, valuable insights risk becoming reports that are read once and forgotten.
Four best practices
Operationalising VoC and CX is less about introducing new technology and more about embedding customer understanding into existing ways of working. Here’s some best practices for bringing the customer voice and experience to the forefront:
1. Integrate customer insight into departmental decision-making
Product teams review customer feedback, operational teams monitor recurring pain points, and marketing teams use customer insight to adapt communications. Embedding insight into existing workflows, rather than adding additional steps, makes it more likely to influence decisions.
2. Present insight differently for different audiences
Executive teams often need strategic themes, while delivery teams benefit from specific customer stories tied to their role. Tailoring insight this way makes it more relevant and easier to act on.
3. Build clear accountability
Customer feedback should lead to actions, named owners and measurable outcomes. This creates visibility around progress and helps organisations demonstrate that customer insight is driving tangible improvements.
4. Close the feedback loop
Sharing improvements internally reinforces the value of VoC and CX programmes, while communicating changes back to customers helps build trust and shows that their feedback genuinely shapes decisions.The bigger picture
These practices can improve how VoC and CX programmes function. However, operationalising customer insight isn't about adding another metric or another step in the process. The real challenge is ensuring customer knowledge becomes meaningful within decision making, and that depends on who is looking at it and why. A product manager and an operations director looking at the same customer satisfaction (CSAT) score need different context and reasons to act.
This is where VoC and CX start to point towards something bigger...
Customer Salience.
It’s all about making customer knowledge consistently relevant and visible, so that insights become part of every important decision, rather than just remaining in a report that gets shared and forgotten. Customer Salience is the transition to a culture that strives to create lasting change.
Ultimately, the organisations that achieve lasting customer centricity aren't those collecting the most feedback. They're the ones that ensure customer knowledge shapes decisions at every level. Bringing VoC and CX together is the foundation, and Customer Salience is what makes it stick.
