The Voice of the Customer Grows Deafening

You spoke, we listened. That’s the tagline of a new Best Buy ad promoting the retailer’s Blue Label computers. The products in the portfolio were developed based on customer requests for certain features and functions.

The voice of the customer is getting louder every day. Domino’s is making better pizzas, it says, because customers said its food reminded them of things that aren’t indigenous to pizza, such as cardboard and ketchup. Procter & Gamble uses its Vocalpoint initiative to take the measure of its customers’ likes and dislikes and turn them into new products. As part of the Blue Label program, Best Buy has sectioned off an area of its website to collect suggestions from customers and non-customers alike.

This is the new era of product development and R&D, and it exists in stark contrast to the era it follows. Time was, companies drew a heavy line between their internal research and development efforts and suggestions from customers. The question of provenance and the definition of intellectual property ruled the day.

In fact, if you look closely at the Domino’s website, you’ll find a relic of that era, even as the company spends big bucks to tell us it is listening and responding to customers. On an FAQ page titled, “Domino’s Cares,” you’ll find the question: Does Domino’s accept ideas or suggestions? The answer:

It is the company’s policy not to accept, consider or review unsolicited ideas. We thank you for your understanding. We appreciate your interest and enthusiasm and hope you continue to enjoy Domino’s Pizza.

So is the company listening or isn’t it? The answer is that it is listening selectively — and that may be the best policy. Because it’s one thing to set up your own focus groups and steer the discussion, but another thing entirely to open the floodgates to ad hoc customer suggestions. Domino’s may not be ready for that or it may have decided that such a practice wouldn’t serve customers well in the end.

In the case of P&G or Best Buy, it’s one thing to cordon off a section of your website and monitor customer sentiment, but it’s entirely another to keep tabs on your company’s standing in the wider digital world, by monitoring blogs, forums, and Twitter conversations far outside your purview.

Don’t get me wrong: The most progressive companies are doing all of that — and P&G and Best Buy may be as well. But for manufacturers testing the waters of a new era, in which the voice of the customer holds ever more weight, the best thing to do may be to start on their own terms and limit the conversation. It’s getting loud out there, after all.

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