Skip to the main content.

3 min read

Why customer surveys?

Why customer surveys?

Using tenant surveys, it is possible to capture what matters most to customers in a structured way and then act on the answers. The real estate companies that have really succeeded in gaining many satisfied tenants have also discovered that it is profitable to take care of their customers. Everyone is a winner when people thrive and feel comfortable, whether at home or at work. Good customer dialogue needs to be created to achieve a high level of customer satisfaction. Therefore, a good start is listening to customers' views and desires. 

Customer journey mapping 

Many of the housing and real estate companies we work with have defined their own customer journey with the aim of identifying, visualising and improving the various steps a tenant goes through during their overall housing experience. AktivBo currently supports a large number of housing companies in mapping customer journeys and the different points of contact tenants have with the company. By continually gauging the tenants' "touchpoints" with the landlord’s various departments and processes, it is possible to improve each part of the customer journey on an ongoing basis, and thereby raise overall customer satisfaction in both the short and long term.

What do we ask about?

Regardless of the project, we find out what you want an answer to. We adapt and tailor the surveys based on the purpose. Through research and together with the industry, we have developed standard questions for a number of specific areas which also serve as the basis for internal comparisons between companies and the industry as a whole.

 Examples of survey types

  • Customer Score Card – Cohesive property management (housing and commercial properties)
  • Interest queue
  • New production
  • Acquisitions
  • Move in / out
  •  Service reporting
  • Customer service
  • Maintenance reporting
  • Replumbing
  • Reconstruction
  • Employee
  • Preliminary studies (ahead of a new production)
  • Additional services / household services
  • Brand
  • Area attractiveness

Integration – automated measurements 

The continuous and ongoing surveys are often activity-based. This necessitates an integration between the systems of AktivBo and the housing/real estate company. Integration is realised with the support of AktivBo's API and enables "trigger-based" questionnaire distribution – 

for instance, in the follow-up of a fault report. When the responsible caretaker or contractor has completed a task in an apartment, the event is registered in the system of the real estate company. Via integration, a questionnaire is automatically sent out to the tenant, who can then detail their experience and quality of the work performed. The same applies for customer service calls or moving-in and -out processes. 

AktivBo currently supports many companies in following up their customer journey (above) via integrated measurements. Digital and automated via integration. 

A survey method that drives improvements 

The cornerstone of our measurement method is to provide a basis for improvement. Not only to provide a measure of customer satisfaction. This means that our way of asking questions and presenting the answers is based upon everyone being able to trust and understand the results. To achieve momentum in the improvement work, measures and actions must be implemented that make a direct impact – one that can be seen in the results. If as an employee one is rewarded for having succeeded in improving customer satisfaction in an important issue, this leads to one continuing with other issues where a potential for improvement is identified. 

High response rate 

With a high response rate, the result can be broken down at all required levels to ensure that the correct action is taken in the right place. This also provides management staff and employees with a clear result for their properties – and they can be confident that "their" tenants/customers are represented and have contributed. 

Standard questionnaire enables benchmarking 

Whatever the project, we find out what you want answers to. We adapt and tailor the questionnaires for this purpose. For a number of specific areas, we have performed many years of research and worked with the industry to develop standard questions, which also form the basis for comparisons internally, between companies and within the industry as a whole. 

Based on the fact that a significant proportion of Sweden's housing and real estate companies continuously measure and compare themselves with our support, we can provide accurate comparisons in a number of different areas based on the standard questions. For example, for overall property management, new construction, renovation and other areas. Of course, there is always the option to add your own custom questions and desired background variables. If you wish to run comparisons with other industries, we can also supply other metrics, for instance CSI and NPS. 

Free-form text answers the customer's own words 

In our tenant surveys, we provide plenty of space for tenants/customers to express their wishes in their own words. The free-form text answers to open questions often contain the customer's motivation for the check marks in the boxes. Quite simply they describe what they are satisfied with and what they want to have improved. This provides important information on which improvements can be based. We report the free-form text answers to the open questions according to the desired categorisation. For example at the company, area or property level. 

Results breakdown by organisational structure 

Upon entry, all data are aggregated according to project and company. We then link the tenants' responses to the questionnaire to the desired level (subdivision) such as for example company/organisation, city, area, building, street address and with the desired background variables. AktivBo has no level restriction on encoding but can report accurately on the desired levels and background variables.  

 

Implementing a customer-driven approach

Implementing a customer-driven approach

Below we have listed best practices, including five important pillars or steps to take to be successful in implementing a customer-centric approach. ...

Read More
The bottom line effects of Tenant Experience

The bottom line effects of Tenant Experience

There are many short-term concrete bottom-line effects when increasing the tenant satisfaction and improving the overall Tenant Experience. These are...

Read More
From planning to implementation

From planning to implementation

Conducting a tenant survey – in other words, asking customers about their thoughts and feelings – is important. But the work does not stop there. To...

Read More