Internal vs. External Perception Analysis

What do your customers think about your business and what do they think about your competitors? Does your staff agree with your customers?

If perceptions between your internal staff and your customer base differ widely, particularly where your sales and marketing team is concerned, then your efforts are likely to be less than optimally effective.

So what can you do to make sure your marketing message resonates with your customers?
Try an Internal vs. External Perception Analysis.

The process is simple – ask the following questions of both your internal team, 50-100 of your current customers, and a random sample of 50-100 people from your target market:

List 3 strengths and 3 weaknesses of {your company}.
Name 3 other top companies in {enter a short description of your market space}, and list 3 strengths and 3 weaknesses for each.

Analyze your results as follows:

Create a list of the top 3 responses for your company in the strengths and weaknesses category from each group. You should have a table that looks something like this (for this example, lets assume you own a McDonalds):

McDonalds	Internal	Customer	Market
Strengths	Fries Branding Kid-friendly (fun)	Fries Kid-friendly (fun) Prices	Fries Prices Branding
Weaknesses	Salads Customization Cleanliness	Unhealthy Noise Service	Unhealthy Service Limited menu

Then, identify the top three companies mentioned in each group (internal, customer, market).

For each company that makes a top 3 list, identify the top 3 strengths and weaknesses for each as identified by each group.

When you’re done you should have a table that looks something like this:

	Internal		Customers		Market
	Strengths	Weaknesses	Strengths	Weaknesses	Strengths	Weaknesses
Burger King	Hamburgers Customization Locations	Limited Menu Fries Building design	Customization Contests Branding	Unhealthy Fries Dirty	Customization Locations Branding	Unhealthy Fries Dirty
Wendy’s	Sides Value menu Customization	Locations Slow drive through No breakfast	Sides Value Menu Customization	Locations Slow drive through No breakfast	Sides Value Menu Customization	Locations Slow drive through No breakfast
Arby’s	Not mentioned	Not mentioned	Adult Choices Prices Healthier	Variety No Salads Salty	Healthier Adult Choices Prices	Locations Branding Variety
Taco Bell	Prices Hours Spicy choices	Indigestion Not kid friendly Cleanliness	Hours Locations Prices	Fattening Not kid friendly indigestion	Not mentioned	Not mentioned
DairyQueen	Not Mentioned	Not Mentioned	Ice Cream Dessert choices Cakes	Hours Locations Limited meal menu	Ice Cream Service Cakes	Hours Locations Limited meal menu

Now, create a table to measure alignment (to calculate percentages, divide the number of matched entries by the total number of entries – i.e if two of the three entries match, you divide 2/3 to get 66%):

	Internal vs. Customers		Internal vs. Market		Customers vs. Market
	Strengths	Weaknesses	Strengths	Weaknesses	Strengths	Weaknesses
Your Company (McDonalds)	66%	0%	66%	33%	66%	66%
Burger King	33%	33%	33%	33%	66%	100%
Wendy’s	100%	100%	100%	100%	100%	100%
Arby’s	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	66%	33%
Taco Bell	33%	66%	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
Dairy Queen	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	66%	100%

Signs that your sales and marketing is well aligned:

Your Internal Team listed all competitors also listed by your customers and competitors.
66% or higher for all internal comparison categories.

Signs that your company may have internal perception issues:

The competitors listed by your customers and your market do not match those mentioned by internal staff.
Lower than 66% for a majority of the internal comparison categories.
Better than 66% alignment between customers and market, and less than 66% alignment between internal and customers/market.

Tips for using the data to improve sales/marketing:

If there is low alignment between your customers and the market in general – work to promote the strengths identified by your customers to the larger markets.
Educate your internal sales staff to stress customer/market perceived strengths of your company and highlight competitor perceived weaknesses when talking to potential customers.
Create new products or product enhancements that compete strongly on competitor weakness areas.
Address perceived weaknesses and create a plan of action to improve your company, or prove to the market that these areas are not important.
Identify where a perceived strength of your company matches a perceived weakness of a competitor and create marketing materials promoting that strength.
Discontinue a product or service where you are perceived as weak and a majority of your competitors are perceived as strong – unless you have a solid plan for change.

Tips for conducting your survey:

Getting your internal team to respond to your survey should just be a matter of asking. Getting customer participation can be more challenging, and finding a focus group of non-customers in your market, more challenging still.

The following are resources that may help you:

Send an email with the survey:
Create a group of email addresses for each category (internal, customer, market) in Outlook or another email program, and simply email the survey to the group. Manually tabulate the responses
Use a free online survey tool to send your survey and tabulate results
QuestionPro
Survey Monkey
Constant Contact
Poll Daddy

To reach the general market (non customers):
Post the survey on your website and include a question asking whether the respondent is a customer or not.
Post the survey on a blog or forum that targets your market and offer to post the results of the survey on the blog/forum.
Get a free limited trial of Hoovers ConnectMail to reach business contacts via email and send your survey.

Bonus Tip: For those non-customers responding to your survey – you now have great insight into how to create a special offer targeted to each respondent in order to win their business.

Bonus Tip 2: Offer a coupon or other special offer to your own customers who respond as a special thank you and as a way to get additional sales.