We spotted this from an interview of Instagram’s Kevin Systrom – the known product wisdom is to listen to customer feedback always and tune the product accordingly. But there is always a difference between what the customers say and what they do. They might say they do not like feature X, but they might be using it often. Or, they might say that they love a particular feature, but might not be using it at all. This scenario is not an exception – it occurs more often than many of us realize.
With all the amplification effects of social media, it is a challenge to ignore what customers ‘say’ and focus on what they ‘do’ with the product. But it is extremely important to measure and understand how your customers interact with your product. That is the signal. What they say about your product, is mostly just noise.
If you are working on a product / service and are trying to work on a list of ‘to-do’ items derived from customer feedback, apply the ‘word or action’ filter – and work on those feedback items that come under ‘action’. Not just because actions speak louder than words – in this case, words do not mean anything at all.
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