Balkonser: Turning NPS Data to Better Decisions and Growth
Balkonser's mission is to make balconies safe, functional, and comfortable. As customer experience is at the heart of its business, guessing about the state of customer satisfaction is not enough. Balkonser's partnership with Trustmary is an example of how systematic NPS measurement and open feedback translate into better day-to-day management that is reflected in customer, staff, and company performance.
Ilkka Ahonen, Managing Director of Balkonser, sums it up: without systematically collecting feedback and reviews, business decisions would inevitably be based on assumptions.
There needs to be a consistent way to measure NPS and collect open feedback on the end-user experience.
– Without collecting and analysing customer feedback, we would have a big black hole in the data we use to make decisions. We would not be where we are as a company without knowing our customers this well. Too many decisions would be made based on guesswork and our own assumptions, says Ahonen.
During his time as CEO, Ahonen has grown Balkonser from a five-person company to a company of around 40 people, which is now Lumon's authorised balcony maintenance brand.
When feedback flows automatically between the ERP system and Trustmary, and directly to the website, AI searches, and Google, the result is a self-running trust machine.
As a result, Balkonser as an organisation can be more in-tune with the voice of the customers, and grow its business.
Balkonser in a nutshell
- Industry: Maintenance of balconies and terraces
- Clients: Housing associations, rental housing companies, real estate companies and consumers
- Staff: ~40
- Mission: Making balconies safe, functional and comfortable
- NPS: 81-90
"You can't run a business without customer feedback"
– If you want to grow and improve processes, ask your customers what they think about you. As a CEO, I wouldn't be able to run a business if I didn't know what our customers think about us, Ahonen sums up.
Balkonser measures customer satisfaction with Trustmary's three-step NPS survey.
- First, we ask you how likely you would be to recommend us to others on a scale of 1-10,
- Next, you can leave open feedback privately or publicly.
- A thank you page redirects you to Google to leave a review.
Ahonen sees many benefits to systematically measuring customer satisfaction, such as process development and overall management through NPS.
– NPS is a really essential measure of overall business management and extremely valuable information for our company. Without the voice of the customer, we are making decisions without knowing all the facts, he continues.
Set Up: Easy Way to Get Feedback on Every Project
Balkonser has two seasons: during the winter season, an employee can spend up to two weeks on one site. During the summer season, they perform quicker services where employees can visit many sites in a single day.
Trustmary integrates with Balkonser's ERP system, so the collection of customer feedback and reviews was fully automated.
– A satisfaction survey is sent to the contact person when the installer marks the job as done. As a result, our response rate has skyrocketed compared to before, and we get real-time customer experience data from the field automatically, says Ahonen.
Feedback Process in a Nutshell:
- ERP triggers: marking a job as complete or sending an invoice automatically triggers a survey to be sent
- Different feedback forms depending on the target group: A building manager gets a different survey than the end user/occupant.
- Everyone has a chance to answer: when the survey goes out to all residents whose contact details Balkonser has, the number of responses jumps significantly.
- Collecting testimonials: Testimonials are collected while measuring customer feedback, and are uploaded to the website and social media every week with a few clicks.
Trustmary Offers Agile and People-oriented Service
Ahonen says that Trustmary is integrated into everyday life and is easy to use. In addition, he praises Trustmary for being a listening and evolving partner.
– If something hasn't worked as we wanted or we've needed help with using the software in a new way, Trustmary has always set up a meeting to solve our issues, Ahonen says.
Over the years of working together, there have been no extra costs, although help has always been available.
– Not once have I received even an extra €50 invoice for helping us out for 30 minutes. Our cooperation has been agile without unnecessary bureaucracy, Ahonen says.
Feedback Fuels Continuous Improvement
When feedback is collected systematically, it can be used to manage staff and improve the company's practices.
– We share the monthly customer satisfaction report directly with employees in a joint WhatsApp group. It's motivating for our employees to receive feedback on the work they have done, Ahonen says.
The Balkonser has been praised in particular for its excellent service.
– If we didn't ask for feedback, all this precious information would be completely missed. What's worse is that the credit for the work done would not reach the people doing the work. We have found that seeing the dozens of 10/10s customers give boosts the morale big time, Ahonen continues.
Customer Satisfaction Reflects Staff Satisfaction
Ahonen can deduce the satisfaction of his employees from customer feedback.
– When employees feel motivated and enjoy their work, customer feedback is positive. If customer satisfaction takes a dip, we immediately get together with our staff to find out why, says Ahonen.
While not all feedback is positive, it is also shared openly with employees.
– We anonymise all negative feedback that mentions employees' names so that no individual employee is put on the spot in front of everyone. However, it is important that everyone reads through the bad feedback so that we can learn from it together, Ahonen says.
Constructive Feedback Helps Improve Business
Ahonen is not afraid of getting bad feedback; in fact, he hopes he gets some.
– I love it that there's bad feedback among all the open feedback. Really. I hope there are negative comments, Ahonen says.
– Not everything can go right every time. We don't just want straight A's, but we also need to hear the negative experiences, because that's how we improve, he continues.
Feedback helps Balkonser to improve its service and processes. Bad feedback also allows them to react quickly.
– We always respond to bad feedback by calling the customer and trying to resolve the situation. The goal is to close the feedback loop quickly and get to the bottom of the root cause, Ahonen says.
Ahonen has also noticed that not all customers dare to send bad feedback via email, but they answer a customer satisfaction survey honestly.
– Not everyone dares to share a complaint via email. They prefer to write it on a feedback form and wait to be contacted, he adds.
Automated surveys and making responding as easy as possible are important for Balkonser, and using Trustmary ensures this.
Customer Reviews Increase Trust
In addition to analysing customer feedback, Balkonser uses public feedback and reviews to build trust online.
– Building trust is particularly important to us because we visit people's homes even when they are not there. You don't want to let just anyone in.
Balkonser showcases reviews on its website in review widgets, shares them on social media channels, and displays them on a dedicated landing page.
All publicly provided feedback will also automatically appear on the Trustmary review page, which can be found in search engines and AI searches.
– Fresh Google reviews are important to us for local search engine visibility. Trustmary's survey redirects responders from the thank you page to Google. Having one survey flow is crucial so we can maximize the number of reviews across different platforms, Ahonen says.
The number of Google reviews has already been raised effortlessly to more than 60, with an average overall star rating of 4.6/5.
The most surprising benefit of using online reviews is the improvement in the employer brand image.
– Prospective employees also scrutinise their potential future employer carefully. It says a lot about a company if it has a proven track record of satisfied customers, says Ahonen.
Benefits of Building Trust:
- Voice of the end-user: collecting masses of data from where the experience is created
- NPS as a measure of leadership: a weekly rhythm to catch red feedback and put the roots in order.
- Social proof: website testimonials and good Google reviews (4.6/5) lower the purchase threshold.
- Brand trustworthiness: transparent feedback builds trust, especially in a competitive environment.
- Improved search engine and AI search discoverability: reviews go up in search engines when searching for business information
- Recruitment: Displaying good customer feedback influences the employer brand image.
Results: World-Class NPS 85-90
By developing its business, Balkonser has already raised its NPS score to 85-90 (on a scale of -100-100), which is much higher than the average NPS for this industry.
Meanwhile, dozens of Google reviews have accumulated, and Balkonser has a 4.6/5 overall star rating.
What makes this particularly exceptional is that feedback and reviews are requested from everyone Balkonser has contact details for.
When the service is first-class, it's worth showing it to the world.
Ahonen is already thinking of new ways to collect even more feedback from the field in the future.
- You can't run a business without customer feedback, Ahonen sums up.
