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Change cookie settingsCustomer Experience
Kvadrat case
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We are in a situation where market dynamics and customers’ expectations are undergoing a transformation – also as we are increasingly switching to digital – so, actually, receiving more frequent feedback so that we can adapt to this new world and the new customer requirements is incredibly important to us so that we can maintain the satisfaction and the focus that we would like to have. My name is Trine Niemann-Platz. I am Vice President of strategy and sustainability, and I am also commercially responsible for Norway. I am part of the group management at Kvadrat. The customer survey provides us with many good insights – also things that lead to subsequent action. My name is Melisa Mygind, I am Strategy Manager here at Kvadrat. I think that our customer survey here at Kvadrat is invaluable to a large part of the organization – practically the whole organization, I would say. We very much look forward to getting the results and identifying what our focus areas should be. For instance, it also affects our three-year plans from a purely strategic perspective, in terms of what we should focus on. We receive good input, which helps and guides us. It also helps us in relation to our employees – the internal as well as the external sales team – in relation to determining their focus in the efforts in the years to come and any development points, since we can also see that the customers point in one direction within the segment they have specialized in, in relation to our own competences. I have an example from the Norwegian market, where we too received some feedback in 2020 on the extent to which our customers understand our sustainability agenda. We were a bit surprised to discover how we were rated relative to our competitors – particularly when we look at what we are actually doing at Kvadrat. So, what we did specifically was ask ourselves how we could improve the perception of our agenda within sustainability, which is incredibly important. And that let to onboarding our salespersons in the dialog they could have with the customers on the market, but we also decided to set up some events – actually together with some of our customers – where we added sustainability to the agenda. Even in the customer survey for 2021, we can see how we have shifted positively due to these specific activities. So this is also an example of how valuable the survey is to us in the development of our business, but also to achieve that awareness that we would not otherwise have had. We have also obtained good findings from a communication perspective. For example, in our survey, one segment asked us to help them improve their customer-facing relationship to the Kvadrat brand. Their customers being the actual end users. We have also taken this into consideration, also with respect to how we should communicate more broadly to “end consumers”. Our employee satisfaction survey actually plays a part in our customer survey because we set some very lofty goals for ourselves concerning what we actually want to contribute as employees in the company. Here, the customer survey provides feedback concerning the extent to which we perceive that customers see and value the efforts we make, but does it also make us better at knowing what actually is good enough. So I also think that this is part of what makes this so interesting There have been lots of useful lessons, which Trine also explains, and this has also led us to survey annually for the first time this year. Previously, we only surveyed every second year, but there is simply too much useful information, so now we are switching to an annual survey. There will, of course, be repetitions of some old topics that are relevant to us in the organization, but there may also be selected topics that we want to explore that year. At Kvadrat, we co-operated with Ennova for many years, which means that Ennova has actually gained a very deep insight into our business. This means that, in this context, Ennova is able to understand our results and also to actually challenge us. Our co-operation is definitely characterized by our openness. An openness – consisting of the ability to discuss results and discuss what is happening on the market, but also an openness that manifests itself when we talk about contracts and so on. One of the things that I think Ennova does really well is to talk to us on equal footing in relation to where we need their expertise. They cover broad areas for us – including process-related matters, technical aspects, and the content of the questionnaire, and they ensure that it is targeted towards what we actually need. They are also good at challenging us on our hypotheses and expectations concerning what we want to ask and how, and also purely on the analysis of the results. We have also had some dialogs in this area – concerning what constitutes significant results and to what degree, and the connection to the history is naturally something we benefit from. So, to sum up briefly, you could say that what we are satisfied with is – the process-related handling as well as the analytical expertise and, in particular, your in-depth knowledge of the market, since Ennova has many other customers and knows what is happening, which means that you can also provide us with feedback on this basis.