Your Feedback Form is Costing You Customers
A customer’s worst moment is usually when they’re asked to rate their experience.
The food was late and, not to mention, cold. The refund didn’t go through and now you’re on the phone when you should be picking up your daughter from school. The delivery driver left the order on the wrong doorstep…And then—ding—a cheerful email lands in their inbox asking, “How likely are you to recommend us to a friend?”
It’s a kind of emotional whiplash. And worse, it's impersonal.
As shared by Jacob Jaber, Co-founder and former CEO of Philz Coffee, the problem isn’t that brands don’t care about feedback—it’s that they ask for it in the most lifeless, transactional way possible.
From CRM to CARE: The AI-Driven Evolution of Customer Relationships
We’ve all been there: “Press 1 for Sales, Press 2 for Support.” You call a company and get bounced between departments and we’re all annoyed by it, but also so used to it. Think about that. Why are we used to navigating the company’s org structure to do business with them? Why is there so much friction in just being able to get in touch with the business and “talk” to them? Imagine grabbing a coffee with a friend was this hard?
After the call, an unrelated email survey arrives from a different system. Later, another team reaches out with a marketing offer unaware of the issue you just had. Each interaction lives in a separate silo – one for sales, another for support, yet another for feedback or marketing. From the customer’s perspective, it feels like talking to a broken robot, repeating yourself at every turn. This fragmentation isn’t just frustrating (33% of customers) say having to repeat themselves to multiple reps is their top annoyance); it’s a symptom of how companies have long managed customer information in disjointed SaaS tools.
Beyond NPS: Why Modern Brands Must Build Customer Relationships in Real Time
For years now, brands have rightfully relied on metrics like Net Promoter Score (NPS), CSAT, and thumbs-up/down ratings to measure customer satisfaction. This was exceptionally helpful to get feedback from busy consumers even if it didn't always capture nuance. But AI enables brands to move well past just capturing feedback/NPS into having real conversations with their customers and moving them forward in real-time.