Hypatia Research Group Publishes 2014 Update to “Operationalizing Voice of the Customer”

LEXINGTON, Mass. - Sept. 10, 2014 - PRLog -- Industry analyst and market research firm Hypatia Research Group (http://www.hypatiaresearch.com/) announces publication of a newly updated primary research study entitled "Operationalizing Enterprise Voice of the Customer (VOC): Best Practices, Maturity Models, and Galaxy^TM  Vendor Evaluations."

Much has changed since Hypatia published the first industry analyst research on Voice of the Customer (VOC) software, services and technologies back in early 2011. At that time, leading vendors were capable of supporting unified VOC analysis of data (structured) and context (unstructured) captured from multichannel information sources. Now, support of unified VOC analysis via Omni-channel information sources is considered table stakes in our evaluation of twenty-three vendors.

According to Leslie Ament https://www.linkedin.com/in/leslieament SVP of research and principal analyst, “What has changed significantly is the volume, variety, speed, and number of information sources or channels that now feed into VOC analysis via enabling software, services and technologies. While our evaluation of VOC has always included both contextual information (qualitative) as well as structured information (quantitative), the sophistication, complexity, and expertise required to design an effective enterprise-level VOC program is lacking at a majority of organizations globally.”

This forty-five page study (http://store.hypatiaresearch.com/operationalizingvoiceoft...) with twenty figures provides end-user organizations with best practice benchmarking, vendor evaluations, business return on investment case studies and an analysis of how and why companies invest in voice of the customer (VOC) software solutions, what tangible benefits are possible, and what metrics can be used to measure the ROI of an enterprise VOC initiative.  In short, our research (http://www.hypatiaresearch.com/) provides actionable insight that companies may use in compiling a vendor short list, request for qualifications and best practice terms of engagement with software vendors and providers of services

Research Approach

Hypatia Research surveyed 1100 global VOC practitioners and executives directly involved with enterprise voice of the customer processes, software usage and selection criteria.  Only the 498 respondents that actually utilize, recommend, influence, hold budget or veto power over the purchase of enterprise VOC software were utilized in our analysis of how, why or when organizations:

·        Invest in VOC software solutions—and how much is budgeted through 2016

·        Measure productivity and effectiveness of VOC initiatives and how often?

·        Prioritize specific VOC initiatives against software selection criteria??

·        Commit a percentage of company revenues to VOC program investment?

·        Expect a return on investment (ROI)?

·        Evaluate and ultimately select VOC vendors or consulting firms?

Our due diligence also included a 1) vendor briefings, 2) product demonstration and 3) customer reference interviews.  In certain cases, customer references and product demonstrations were obtained without vendor involvement through our professional network.

Survey Respondent Profiles
Respondents operate primarily in North America (35.7%), with healthy representation from Asia Pacific (34.7%), Europe (28.8%) and the Middle East (1%).  Among the 498 respondents, the organizations were divided among SMBs (4.1%) with revenues under $100 million, mid-market (34.3%) and large enterprises (61.5%) with $2 billion or more in revenues. Both business to business (B2B) and business to consumer (B2C) industries were equally represented.

About
Industry analyst and market research firm Hypatia Research Group (http://www.hypatiaresearch.com/) delivers high impact market intelligence, industry benchmarking, best practice, maturity model and vendor selection research for how businesses use software technology, professional services and management consulting providers to capture, manage, analyze and apply customer and market intelligence to enhance corporate performance and to accelerate growth. Coverage includes: Customer Management (CRM), Business Intelligence, Advanced Analytics, Big Data Insights, Customer Analytics, Social Media, Text Analytics, Digital Marketing, Information Management, Customer Data Management/Data Quality and GRC. Since 2001, clients have relied on Hypatia for industry insight, expertise and independent market research for guidance in assessing various technology and service options.

For advisory, licensing (http://www.hypatiaresearch.com/) or further analysis on this topic by company size, industry, job function or geography, please contact Research@HypatiaResearch.com or call 781-862-5106.

Contact:
Zvi Ruder, SVP Operations & Intellectual Property Licensing
Hypatia Research Group
ZGR@HypatiaResearch.com
781-862-5106