Reducing Satisfaction Surveys

Introduction

Zendesk's Satisfaction Rating (Professional and Enterprise) allows customers to rate and comment on tickets. By default, 24 hours after solving a ticket, an email goes to the customer offering the rating.

For customers with low ticket volumes, this email is unlikely to be a burden. Where customers create many tickets the satisfaction email may be detrimental to your service.

This article will assume that the default approach is appropriate for most customers. But there are specific organisations that should never receive an email. These customers can continue to rate tickets through the Help Centre.

The default automation

An automation sends the default satisfaction rating. You cannot restrict automations to a sample of tickets. For example, you cannot have a condition:

•  Ticket status is: 1 in 4 solved tickets

Or use:

• If random number is: less than 10%

Consequently, it is difficult to suppress the standard automation from high volume customers.

Offering satisfaction rating

To allow a ticket rating, a business rule must include the action:

You will find this in the default automation 'Request customer satisfaction rating (System Automation)'. This is available in both triggers and automations.

Organisation settings

A custom organisation field will set how customers receive satisfaction ratings. If you prefer, you can use custom user fields instead.

The organisation field will hold different satisfaction offering options.

• When solving tickets. The notify customer when solving ticket automation will offer the satisfaction rating.
• 24 Hours from solved (no mail). An automation will offer satisfaction, but no email will send.
• 24 Hours from solved (with mail). The standard system automation.

Where the custom field is blank, the default 24 Hours from solved (with mail) will apply.

You can add further options to the list. You just have to ensure that your triggers and automations reflect the choices presented.

Name the custom field 'Satisfaction offered'.

And include a description for Agents.

 And our options:

After adding a custom field, refresh your browser (CTRL + F5) to see the changes.

Offer satisfaction rating when solving tickets

The trigger notifying the requester of a solved ticket will include the satisfaction rating. This must accommodate customers served by automations and tickets solved with no public comment.

 

Trigger to fire
	Public Comment Present
Satisfaction offered on solve	YES	NO
YES	Notify requester of solved request with Satisfaction	Offer requester satisfaction rating
NO	Notify requester of solved request	N\A

Notify requester of solved request with Satisfaction

Clone the standard 'Notify requester of solved request' trigger. Add a condition to check the custom organisation field.

Change the notification to include the satisfaction narrative and offer the satisfaction rating.

I have placed the satisfaction section first to give it more prominence.

Notify requester of solved request

When solving a ticket, the standard notification trigger should no longer fire. Add a condition to check the custom field. 

Offer requester satisfaction rating

Finally, we offer the satisfaction rating when solving a ticket with no public comment. There is no condition for 'comment not present'. But if we have already offered a satisfaction rating, this trigger should not fire.

The conditions are:

And the actions:

If you prefer, you can omit the notification action. The offer satisfaction action allows the customer to rate the ticket in the Help Centre.

Offer satisfaction from time solved

Automations generate time delayed satisfaction ratings.

The standard automation must only include customers that are to receive an email. Add conditions to the 'Any' section.

Finally, a new automation will offer the satisfaction rating with no notification.

The conditions are:

And the action is:

Final check

You now have:

• A custom organisation drop-down field to hold your satisfaction options

Triggers to offer a satisfaction rating when solving a ticket:

• Notify requester of solved request with Satisfaction
• Notify requester of solved request
• Offer requester satisfaction rating

Automations to offer satisfaction some time after solving the ticket:

• Request customer satisfaction rating (System Automation)
• Request customer satisfaction rating (No Notification)

Summary

Before setting a customer's rating method, you may want to reach out for their feedback. Suppressing notifications or combing with other emails may reduce your response rate. Linking custom fields to business rules gives you more control over the process.