15 Customer Effort Score Survey Questions for Improving Customer Experience
Let’s say you work for a company that is looking for ways to improve customer experience by focusing on how easy it is for customers to interact with their products or services. The right customer effort score survey questions can produce the desired results in no time.
Unlike surveys that measure customer satisfaction or loyalty, customer effort score surveys specifically look at how simple and effortless different customer interactions are.
Keep reading to find out why customer effort score surveys are useful and beneficial, and discover 15 example questions you can use for your survey with 123FormBuilder, which makes designing and sharing surveys easier.
What is a Customer Effort Score Survey?
A customer effort score survey (or CES) is a single-question or multi-question survey designed to measure how easy it is for customers to:
- interact with a company
- complete a task
- resolve an issue
The customer effort score survey aims to quantify the amount of effort customers exert when dealing with different customer service channels, online transactions, and other customer experience touchpoints.
Three Reasons Companies Use Customer Effort Score Surveys
There are many reasons to use customer effort score surveys for your company, including:
- Identify pain points in customer interactions – CES surveys help businesses locate specific areas where customers are encountering difficulty. High-effort areas in the customer journey, such as complex website navigation or challenging support experiences, can be highlighted and addressed.
- Predict customer loyalty and retention – Studies show that customers who have low-effort interactions are more likely to remain loyal to a brand. By lowering the customer effort, companies can create a smoother and more satisfying experience, leading to higher customer retention.
- Reduce operational costs – Low-effort customer interactions often translate into fewer follow-up contacts, lower handling times, and reduced support costs. For example, companies can decrease the volume of repetitive service requests by identifying and addressing areas where customers struggle.
Why Customer Effort Score Surveys Are Important
Customer effort score surveys are essential because they provide insight into how challenging or simple customers find it to interact with a business. High-effort interactions can lead to frustration, dissatisfaction, and eventually lost customers.
A CES survey helps organizations understand if they need to simplify processes or improve their support to make customer experiences more seamless.
123FormBuilder is an excellent tool for creating, distributing, and analyzing customer effort score surveys. With its intuitive form-building options, organizations can customize CES questions and analyze results without needing specialized technical knowledge.
Three Benefits of Using Customer Effort Score Surveys
Let’s quickly see why customer effort score surveys are beneficial for your organization:
- Improved customer satisfaction – By pinpointing high-effort interactions and addressing them, companies can make the customer journey more enjoyable, leading to happier customers.
- Increased customer loyalty – customer effort score surveys are directly linked to loyalty – low-effort experiences tend to create stronger customer bonds, as customers are less likely to leave if they find interactions straightforward.
- Improved customer service efficiency – When customers can resolve issues with minimal effort, customer service teams can operate more efficiently, focusing on complex cases while reducing the time spent on repetitive inquiries.
123FormBuilder is ideal for creating customer effort score surveys that help streamline customer service and boost efficiency by gathering feedback that pinpoints areas needing improvement.
15 Customer Effort Score Survey Questions
Here are 15 example customer effort score questions that you can incorporate into a survey, especially using a tool like 123FormBuilder, to quickly gauge customer effort and gather actionable insights.
How easy was it to complete your recent transaction with us?
– Used to assess the customer’s experience with specific transactions, helping identify whether checkout or payment processes need simplification.
How much effort did it take to resolve your issue with our customer support?
– Ideal for understanding the efficiency of support channels and pinpointing areas that need improvement.
On a scale of 1 to 7, how easy was it to navigate our website?
– Aids in identifying usability issues on websites, guiding UX/UI improvements.
How easy was it to find the information you were looking for on our site?
– Helps evaluate the site’s information architecture and content accessibility.
How simple was it to make changes to your account settings?
– Useful for assessing the customer’s ease in managing personal or billing information, often a common frustration point.
Did you encounter any challenges while using our mobile app?
– Focuses on mobile usability, revealing potential obstacles in app design or functionality.
How easily could you contact us when you had an issue?
– Measures accessibility and responsiveness of customer support channels, whether online or phone-based.
Did you find our self-service options (FAQs, knowledge base) helpful?
– Used to assess the effectiveness of self-service tools, which can reduce customer effort if well-organized.
Was the process of returning/exchanging a product straightforward?
– Reveals issues in return policies or processes that may require simplification.
How easy was it to understand the product/service pricing?
– Focuses on transparency and clarity in pricing, which can reduce customer effort in decision-making.
How would you rate the simplicity of our subscription cancellation process?
– Evaluates the ease of ending a service, a crucial aspect of customer satisfaction and transparency.
How simple was it to update your payment information?
– Used to assess ease in managing billing-related tasks, which are often high-friction interactions.
Did you feel that our support staff provided solutions quickly?
– Provides insights into the effectiveness and efficiency of customer support resolutions.
On a scale of 1 to 7, how straightforward was it to track your order status?
– Used to evaluate the customer experience in tracking orders, particularly important for e-commerce.
Was it easy to understand the instructions for [specific product/service]?
– Ideal for gauging how clear product instructions are, helping refine support resources or guides.
With 123FormBuilder, businesses can quickly set up any of these questions in a CES survey. By choosing specific question formats and response options, they can easily track customer effort levels and adjust touchpoints accordingly.
How to Implement a CES Survey with 123FormBuilder
The first step is to sign up for a 123FormBuilder account. Then, pick a survey form template and add/remove questions or build a form from scratch.
- Choose your questions carefully – Use the customer effort score question examples above to select relevant questions for your business, focusing on areas where effort tends to be high.
- Design the survey with ease – With 123FormBuilder, creating a survey is straightforward. Use the drag-and-drop interface to customize question formats, and add conditional logic to show different questions based on user responses.
- Publish and analyze – 123FormBuilder offers versatile publishing and sharing options, including email, website embedding, and mobile-friendly formats. This makes it easy for customers to respond. The platform also offers analytics tools to help interpret survey results.
Conclusion
Customer Effort Score surveys are an invaluable resource for companies looking to improve customer satisfaction and loyalty by focusing on simplicity and ease of interaction. Tools like 123FormBuilder make it easy to create, customize, and analyze CES surveys, helping companies gather targeted feedback on how challenging (or easy) customers find each part of their journey.
By addressing high-effort interactions, businesses can reduce customer frustration, streamline customer support, and ultimately build stronger, longer-lasting relationships with their clients.
