If your customers are asked to evaluate your business, did you know that the scale used in a survey could affect the outcome?
The Olinger Group studied both 6-point scales and 5-point scales for customer service. One scale listed the following options to the question “Are you satisfied with…” – Very Satisfied, Satisfied, Neither, Dissatisfied, Very Dissatisfied. An unconventional 6-point scale gave the options as Extremely Satisfied, Very Satisfied, Satisfied, Dissatisfied, Very dissatisfied and Extremely Dissatisfied. While 93% of respondents chose the one of the top three options on a 6-point scale, 98% of respondents chose one of the top two options on the 5-point scale.
This study showed that fewer options lead to higher percentages of satisfaction. For some clients, the differences in these customer satisfaction results could equal to hundreds of thousands of dollars.
