Gathering accurate feedback is important for any organization looking to improve and grow. But to do this, your business needs to collect accurate and honest feedback from your community, and share them effectively with the organization.

So what does this process look like in action? How can your business connect with your users or broader business peers, or your community, to collect feedback that's actionable, and empower teams to make the right decisions using the information gathered? 

What is community feedback?

Community feedback is input, opinions, and suggestions from a broader group of people connected to your business or industry. It could come from customers, employees, partners, industry experts, or other community members who are influenced by your organization .

When seeking to collect feedback, we often have to get community input from several sources, so that the organization can get a comprehensive and accurate picture that represents various viewpoints.

Usually, the more viewpoints are considered in the organization’s feedback mechanism, the higher the chances that you can:

• Increase the accuracy of information gathered
• Create targeted improvement plans
• Minimize biases
• Identify problems early
• Innovate and grow

Read more: How Different Companies Communicate Internally

Key aspects of community feedback mechanisms

"Community" is a broad term, and it’s possible to keep expanding the feedback circle until everything becomes overwhelming and useless. It’s also possible for an organization to zero in on one group of stakeholders and completely ignore other valuable sources of feedback.

Here are some of the most important things or other….

Customer feedback

Feedback from paying customers is often a huge focus for businesses because they decide how well the business does. Happy customers can mean repeat business, word of mouth referrals, and company growth.

Setting up effective communication channels like surveys, polls or testimonials are a great way to gather valuable information.

Employee feedback

Employee feedback can be a huge part of your community's opinions, especially when it's influenced by customer actions.

For example, sales staff often talk to current and potential customers regularly and know what their complaints, reservations and praises are. Employees who use the company’s product internally can also give objective and qualitative data that can help improve the product. Analyzing this can help identify themes and patterns, leading to better decision-making and enhanced community engagement.

Stakeholder feedback

Feedback from groups like supplies and contractors, upper management, and investors usually falls into this bucket. Even though they aren’t paying customers, stakeholders have a keen interest in improving the company, and a unique perspective on what’s currently working and what isn’t.

Public feedback

Public feedback is information gathered from public forums and other sources. These are usually from people who have used or interacted with the product or service, and they provide a unique point of view. Organizing community events to gather insights and foster dialogue can enhance the relevance and meaningfulness of the feedback collected.

When reviewing public feedback, it’s possible to come across inaccurate and unverified information, or comments taken out of context. So, a cautious approach may be required.

Read More: The Guide to Good Internal PR

How to gather accurate community feedback

Gathering feedback from community members is usually an ongoing process, and one that might need occasional review. It's also often the role of a community manager to monitor this process and the engagement across various platforms, as community engagement can be a full time job in and of itself.

With that said, these are the most common and effective methods of sourcing community feedback.

1. Go over testimonials and reviews from online platforms

Reviews and testimonials are a great place to find out what customers are saying about your business. They can help you answer questions like:

• Why do people switch over to competitors?
• What do customers love most about our product?
• What is the biggest pro/con of our offering?
• What do people find most challenging about working with our organization?

It's important to create a feedback loop by effectively reaching diverse audiences, but more often than not, reviews and testimonials are a strong starting point.

Read more: How to Create Feedback Loops in the Workplace

Review platforms like G2, Capterra, TrustPilot, Google Reviews, and Yelp are great places to check. But you can also create your own community on sites like Reddit, or check for questions or queries in your industry niche on sites like Quora,

2. Break down quantitative data from survey results

Surveys are excellent for investigating specific aspects of your business’ offerings. You can structure questions to address various parts of your business or simply find out how satisfied your customers are. Analyzing quantitative data from these surveys can help identify themes and patterns that inform

It’s possible, however, to misinterpret survey data, which can skew your conclusions or send your company on a wild goose chase. To keep things on track, consider the following:

• Group your audience into relevant segments. This can make it easier to identify patterns.
• Focus on important metrics and watch out for outliers. Unusually high or low numeric responses can sway results.
• Look for trends and patterns. These often emerge over time, and could be the missing link.
• Keep response bias in mind. Sometimes, respondents provide answers they think you want to hear.
• Consider external factors. Market trends, seasonality, or recent events can affect responses.

3. Don’t ignore live conversion data from dashboards 

While customer reviews and survey responses are essential, live conversion data can offer a more objective view of how your business is performing. If your business uses dashboards that track conversion rates, bounce rates, and customer behavior across your platform, these can tell you how customers are interacting with your product.

For example, you can see specific pages or processes where customers drop off, which could indicate a friction point in your user journey. Conversion data can also provide actionable insights to customer preferences or behavior that won’t show up in surveys or reviews.

Read more: Best Apps for Corporate Communication

4. What do online forums and communities say?

People often go to online forums and communities to rant about poor features, or sing the praises of products they love. Your business can pay attention to these for a less formal but valuable window into customers’ thoughts. Sometimes, online spaces can even offer more information than a company sponsored community survey.

You can learn about:

• Common frustrations customers face
• Success stories your team haven’t heard about
• Commonly-used workarounds for your offer’s shortcomings
• Competitors that frustrated costumes turn to
• How a diverse group of people perceive your company

An added bonus is that active participation in these communities can improve your reputation and give your business a chance to interact directly with customers.

One thing to keep in mind with information like this is that it can be overly negative or contain bias that doesn’t reflect the majority view.

5. Ask for feedback from customer support 

Your customer support team interacts with clients on a daily basis and is often the first to hear about issues or concerns. This makes them a valuable resource for gathering feedback that might not show up in any of the other sources on this list. Organizing focus groups can also be crucial for obtaining in-depth feedback from customers, providing deeper insights into their behaviors and preferences.

One great benefit with customer support data is that it often reflects real-time concerns, allowing you to respond quickly and implement changes.

It might be helpful to create a system where support agents regularly relay feedback to product or leadership teams, so that everyone is always on top of potential problems.

Read More: Communication Skills for the Workplace

6. Discuss consultant and expert reviews

Finally, it’s worth considering feedback from industry experts or consultants. These professionals can offer an external, unbiased perspective on your business, which is often more comprehensive and analytical than any customer feedback. Incorporating expert feedback into decision-making processes can also ensure that strategic choices are well-informed and aligned with industry standards.

Consultants can help identify areas of improvement that may not be obvious from customer data alone, like operational inefficiencies, market positioning, or brand perception.

Expert reviews, on the other hand, are particularly helpful when you’re planning significant changes, like entering a new market or launching a new product.

Ideas for sharing community feedback with your organization

After gathering all the information you need, it’s time to translate them to action, and that begins with making sure that the feedback reaches the right departments. Here are some ideas that can help.

1. All-hands meetings

All hands meetings, often referred to as the town hall meeting, are used to bring the whole organization together.

These types of community meetings are an excellent way to share key feedback highlights that concern the whole company. This way, everyone from leadership to entry-level staff are aware of the concerns and achievements of the company.

2. Presentations to key stakeholders

These will involve feedback that affects strategic decisions and can focus on high-level concerns and opportunities. These presentations can help ensure that leaders have a clear understanding of customer experiences, challenges and expectations, and can take that into account during decision making. 

You can use enterprise digital signage screens to visualize figures and key metrics to really drive home the point.

Read More: Use Cases for Screen Sharing with Digital Signage

3. Visual feedback displays in the office

Office digital signage can help make visual displays like charts and dashboards accessible to everyone in the organization. These can be set up in employee break rooms, or shared digital spaces to ensure that everyone is aware of customer sentiment and trends.

4. Recognition of successes and opportunities

Publicly acknowledging both successes and areas for improvement can create a culture of transparency and motivation in the company. You can use digital signage screens to celebrate positive feedback and boost morale, while openly addressing challenges and opportunities for growth.

Read More: Create an Employee Recognition Wall

5. Employee newsletters and intranet updates

Newsletters are another excellent way to share regular feedback with everyone in the company, even people who may not attend larger meetings. These updates can include summaries of customer feedback, highlight ongoing improvement efforts, and offer tips for employees to enhance their own interactions with customers.

6. Anonymous feedback roundups

Compiling anonymous feedback, either from customers or employees, helps bring attention to concerns that might not be openly shared. Sharing these insights with relevant teams can help address underlying issues that may not be immediately obvious. 

7. Internal reports

Comprehensive internal reports can allow leadership and management to dive deep into feedback data without having to squeeze them into 15-minute presentations. These reports can include key metrics, in-depth analyses, and even recommendations for a more user centric design, all laid out in a comprehensive format. 

8. Team-specific feedback sessions

Some feedback may be most relevant to specific teams or departments, and organizing sessions is a great way to communicate the information. 

For example, the product development team may focus on feedback regarding features, while customer service teams might delve into communication issues. These focused discussions can give the teams the tools to take ownership of improvements in their areas.

Use ScreenCloud to share community feedback

There are many platforms for sharing feedback, from written emails to meetings and presentations. Corporate digital signage can help make parts of your feedback sharing easier, whether it’s presentations to a team of stakeholders, or visual feedback displays in office areas.

ScreenCloud's digital signage solution makes communication easy for businesses. For example, you can easily connect dashboards like Grafana, Power BI, and display them on any screen in your network. Or, turn any screen into a collaborative whiteboard or presentation tool using our app integrations.

We have a host of other features and integrations that can improve your community engagement and feedback systems.

Start a 14-day free trial to test it out. Or, book a demo here.