A lot of thought goes into the way we shop. We usually don’t buy things on a whim and even the little questions add up: did we like that brand? The color? Was it on sale?
Every purchase tells a story.
So what have your customers been telling you lately? And how can you harness that information to enhance your marketing strategies and improve business?
Like the legendary, bowl-cut sporting hero He-Man once said: “I HAVE THE POWER… to improve retention, optimize conversions, and drive long-term customer satisfaction by using post-purchase surveys!” …Or something like that.
A lot of brands hesitate to add a post-purchase survey into their checkout process for a few reasons.
Maybe they don’t know the use cases yet.
Maybe they think it’s too much work.
Or maybe their marketing efforts are stretched thin juggling 12 tabs of Klaviyo and a Slack channel that never sleeps.
But the payoff is real. Especially for ecommerce brands competing on attention and loyalty.
Post-purchase surveys help you:
- Boost response rates by meeting shoppers where they already are (like sms or on-site forms)
- Collect customer feedback that turns into actionable insights
- Reduce guesswork in the purchase decision stage
- Improve user experience across the full purchase process
- Increase customer satisfaction by acting on what you actually learn
- Access zero-party data brands can’t extract from cookies or pixel events alone
- Give teams a reliable sample size to reduce nonresponse bias
And step one to doing this is learning how to analyze and apply your post-purchase survey data to make smarter business decisions.
Read on and we’ll teach you how to properly harness your post-purchase survey data and post-purchase feedback with the precision of He-Man wielding his legendary Power Sword (last reference, promise).
Unlocking your potential with post-purchase surveys
Don’t just scratch the surface. It’s time to plunder the depths of your customer data and get deep.
There are four main types of data to collect from post-purchase surveys:
- Behavioral data: Can help you understand your customers’ motivations, preferences, purchasing habits, and demographics like buying for self vs. gift. Use this data to get a competitive advantage and help paint a clearer picture of your business as your customers see you and also gain repeat customers.
- Attribution data: Can help pinpoint exactly what drove the purchase decision. Use marketing attribution data and marketing channels to help inform your marketing practices and figure out what’s really working and what actually influenced purchase decision. A lot of this data can enhance the customer experience and shed some light on what may be holding them back.
- CRO feedback: Can help you identify bumps in the online buying process on your quest to provide a seamless experience for your customers. This also uncovers pain points or friction in the checkout process
- Product development: These valuable insights help refine or develop new products. The insights flags interest in a new product or must-add product features
If you’re on the hunt for new ideas, what better way to get inspired than by your customers?
Bonus bucket?
Customer insights tied to nps sentiment, because loyalty is a feeling, not just a metric.
And unlike most survey tools, this data shows up real-time if your setup supports it.
Now you know the types of data you can get — but how do you get it?
Easy!
4 types of data to dig into
Don’t just scratch the surface. It’s time to plunder the depths of your customer data and get deep.
There are four main types of data to collect from post-purchase surveys:
- Behavioral data: Can help you understand your customers’ motivations, preferences and purchasing habits. Use this data to get a competitive advantage and help paint a clearer picture of your business as your customers see you.
- Attribution data: Can help pinpoint exactly what drove the purchase decision. Use marketing attribution data to help inform your marketing practices and figure out what’s really working.
- CRO feedback: Can help you identify bumps in the online buying process on your quest to provide a seamless experience for your customers.
- Product development: Can gather feedback to refine or develop new products. If you’re on the hunt for new ideas, what better way to get inspired than by your customers?
Now you know the types of data you can get — but how do you get it?
Easy!
Strike data gold with these top post-purchase survey questions
Use these post-purchase survey question examples to help get exactly the data you’re angling for.
For behavioral data…
- “Did you buy this for yourself or as a gift?”
- “What would you improve about your shopping experience?”
- “Why did you choose us over one of our competitors?”
For attribution data…
- “How did you hear about us?”
- “What influenced your decision to buy today?”
- “Do you always wait for a sale before purchasing on our site?”
For CRO feedback…
- “What almost stopped you from completing your purchase?”
- “Was there any part of our store that was difficult to use?”
- “Did you have any issues placing your order?”
For product development feedback…
- “What feature was most important to you?”
- “Which other products are you interested in?”
- “Who do you want to see us collaborate with?”
For purchase motivation insights…
- “What problem are you hoping this product solves?”
- “Once you’ve solved your problem with [product], what’s next?”
- “What motivated you to buy today?”
You can also pull your questions directly from our free bank of ecommerce survey questions faster than it will take you to read this sentence.
The right time and place to distribute your survey
What’s the best time to try and catch customers you want to take your survey? When they’re most engaged, of course – immediately after checkout or post-delivery.
Beyond that, you have a few options for the format of your survey:
- On-site forms after purchase: A two or three-question form that can yield high response rates for essential data points like purchase motivation or product preferences. With Klaviyo, the data that flows into your marketing system is ready for immediate use in follow-up campaigns.
- Follow-up message with a survey link: The moments right after someone has purchased from you are precious, and you’ll want to capitalize on them. You can send a dedicated survey link via email or SMS for that personal touch that will yield even deeper insights.
What to do with your data (AKA the fun part)
What good is data if you can’t do anything with it? Luckily, there are plenty of fun ways to play with your data and put it to good use.
- Personalize your marketing strategy:
- Segment gift buyers for holiday campaigns
- Send product recommendations based on customer preferences
- Tailor messaging frequency to match buying habits
- Use your attribution data and insights to:
- Identify high-performing marketing channels to effectively spend your ad budget
- Measure campaign success with direct customer feedback
- Use your CRO data to address common friction points to improve the checkout process.
- Develop or refine products based on your product development data and feature requests or customer preferences.
- Use insights to create retention campaigns for former customers:
- “We noticed you loved [X product]—check out this complementary item.”
- Integrate your data with advanced tools:
- Automatically sync survey responses for segmentation and flows with Klaviyo integration (learn more below!)
- Build advanced segments (e.g., repeat buyers, VIP customers, gift buyers)
- Use survey-driven insights to trigger personalized email and SMS campaigns
Dig even deeper by building enhanced customer segments through Klaviyo
Think about someone buying jewelry in December. Are they a collector? Is it a gift? Lucky for you, post-purchase survey data can easily tell you.
With the combined powers of KnoCommerce and Klaviyo, you can build enhanced customer segments so that the customer only receives marketing around gift-giving holidays. This means you’re only delivering the most relevant content, potentially preventing them from unsubscribing.
Together, they help ecommerce brands:
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Automate segmentation using post-purchase survey data
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Improve customer satisfaction by acting on valuable insights
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Increase customer loyalty for repeat customers
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Build use cases around purchase motivation, gifting, and lifestyle
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Sync post-purchase survey data into email and sms outreach
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Improve customer retention by reacting to survey results faster
Segmentation pays.
In fact, most ecommerce brands see 3X more revenue per recipient when campaigns are based on data-driven segments built from post-purchase feedback and customer surveys.
Now take a fitness apparel brand that finds out a customer is a runner and not just someone who likes to wear workout clothing. Now the brand can tailor their messages to speak directly to the customer’s lifestyle: “New shorts perfect for your morning run.”
Why is this worth it? Well, highly segmented campaigns return more than 3 times the revenue per recipient as unsegmented campaigns.
Tailor your frequency and content based on buying patterns and watch your engagement skyrocket.
How to make your data really sing
Honestly, name a more iconic duo than KnoCommerce and Klaviyo.
Here’s why: you can use KnoCommerce to integrate your survey responses into Klaviyo and help action your data. Let’s lay out that process here:
- Collect the right data. Design your post-purchase survey to capture actionable insights. See our list of example questions above to help narrow down what data you want.
- Integrate your survey tool with Klaviyo. Sync survey responses seamlessly into Klaviyo using KnoCommerce. You can:
- Create a private Klaviyo API key with full access to Profiles and Lists.
- Choose a “catch-all” list in Klaviyo to store customer profiles for segmentation.
- Enable survey questions in KnoCommerce to push responses directly as custom properties in Klaviyo profiles.
- Set up Klaviyo post-purchase flows. Use survey responses to trigger automated email sequences. For example if someone selects “gift” in their survey, tag them for seasonal campaigns and holiday reminders. Follow up with product education emails for first-time buyers or upsell opportunities based on preferences.
- Build advanced segments. Create dynamic customer segments with Klaviyo segmentation using synced survey data. This neat trick will help you:
- Identify VIPs and spotlight your most loyal highest-spending customers.
- Pinpoint first-time vs. repeat buyers and tailor messaging to nurture new customers or reward repeat ones.
- Develop feedback-driven strategies by using insights from survey responses to engage customers with personalized recommendations.
Learn more about Klaviyo integration here.
Ready to get to know your customers better?
So what have we learned today? Tldr:
- Post-purchase survey data is a must-have tool to better understand and engage with your customers.
- You can build out advanced customer segments by using KnoCommerce to seamlessly sync your survey responses into Klaviyo.
- This can help you craft marketing strategies that drive customer retention, optimize conversions and improve long-term customer satisfaction.
What’s next? Try Knocommerce for free here and see what data you start to capture in just one month of running surveys. We have surveys templates to help get set up in as little as five minutes.