Managing User Feedback and Communications
By Sangeeta Gupta, Ron Kim, Abdallah Hassan and Marijke Hallo de Wolf
Regardless of how different sites invite feedback, the objectives are similar:
- to learn who their users are;
- to gauge their impressions of the site;
- to understand their needs; and
- to address any problems they encountered with the site.
Although creating a new Web site is a very detailed and labour-intensive project, it is merely the first step. Most sites go through several iterations and re-designs, and one of the most important causes of this evolution is the feedback a Web manager and his/her organization receive from users. Each change or update should reflect a response to users' needs and concerns. The bottom line is that the quality of the user experience is the most critical variable in determining the success of a CSO site, precisely because users will come and go depending largely on how well the site responds to their needs.
Because user feedback is so vital, it should be taken seriously. Too often, feedback is ignored or unacknowledged mainly because the Web manager and other staff are overwhelmed and do not have the time to evaluate the results or send individual replies. The irony is that many organizations are able to devote sufficient resources to create a new site, but are subsequently unable to commit the resources required to manage user feedback. Thus, the tension is between needing external comments and being able to allocate the time for responding to inquiries and requests. The Web manager must, therefore, strike a balance early on between soliciting certain types of feedback and realistically assessing how much time will be spent encouraging/evaluating/acting upon them. In other words, he/she is responsible for creating a system that is responsive but efficient and not overly time-consuming.
This part of the manual will address and provide guidelines on interrelated issues that Web managers will face inevitably (the sooner the better!) in the area of feedback.
Issues Index
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