Voice of the Customer (VoC) is how a customer feels about a product or service. In order for businesses to remain successful, they must focus on meeting customers’ needs and expectations. Also, to retain customers and keep them happy, they should know if customers are dissatisfied with a product or service. Therefore, customer feedback is key for companies that aim to understand and take into consideration customer sentiments to improve customer experience.
Companies in the retail and manufacturing sectors, for instance, have started opting for VoC solutions to better understand their customers’ expectations and gain insights into their preferences and any complaints they may have. VoC is increasingly becoming a core strategy for businesses that can effectively use this data to understand customer preferences, ultimately helping them drive customer loyalty.
This blog compares the SPARK Matrix™ for Voice of the Customer Platforms for 2023 and 2024, published by QKS Group, formerly Quadrant Knowledge Solutions. This will help us better understand shifts in the landscape and identify changes in positions across the matrices.
The Leaders
Some vendors maintained their leadership positions in 2023 and 2024. These vendors displayed strengths like constant innovation and delivering actionable insights. While the 2024 matrix included several leaders from 2023, it also highlighted a few new vendors who made it to the Leaders quadrant.
Qualtrics, Medallia, and InMoment were leaders in both 2023 and 2024. They continued to show innovation in terms of AI-driven insights, real-time feedback analysis, and seamless integration. Their VoC solutions enable businesses to collect data from multiple channels, in addition to providing enterprise-grade analytics. Their solutions are suitable for large businesses looking to capture the entire spectrum of customer sentiment.
NICE, also positioned as a leader for two consecutive years, is well known for providing customer engagement solutions. It offers in-depth experience analytics by combining AI with data management. NICE’s Customer Feedback Management solution can integrate feedback from multiple touchpoints, making it ideal for businesses that are looking to streamline customer interactions.
Verint helps users better understand customer behavior through AI-driven predictive modeling. Its VoC software also helps businesses capture, analyze, and act on customer feedback in real time. Its integration with multiple business systems and data sources and focus on customization makes it suitable for large businesses.
QuestionPro, another consistent leader, offers robust survey tools, AI-driven data insights, and user-friendly interfaces, which help brands gather customer feedback efficiently and act promptly. It also emphasizes multi-channel feedback collection and advanced data analytics, further solidifying its position.
New Entrants and Upgrades in the Leaders Quadrant
The 2024 matrix features some new vendors in the Leaders quadrant, reflecting how rapidly the VoC landscape is evolving.
Sprinklr, a new vendor in the Leader quadrant, is known for providing comprehensive customer experience management solutions. It focuses on social listening and engagement, which helps companies understand customer sentiment across various digital touchpoints, including social media and messaging apps, in real time.
SANDSIV moved its way up, from emerging leader in 2023 to leader in 2024. Its advanced data processing capabilities help it turn raw customer data into actionable insights. Its platform also offers scalability and customization, helping companies tailor solutions to their specific needs. It also focuses on data privacy and compliance, providing companies with a reliable way to manage customer feedback.
Pisano also moved up higher in the leader quadrant, likely owing to its dynamic feedback management and data-driven decision support. The platform also provides an advanced survey builder. Its advanced text analysis feature helps businesses diagnose issues, predict trends, and adopt effective strategies to improve customer experience.
Kapture CX, a new leader in the 2024 SPARK Matrix, is recognized for its AI-powered ticketing and feedback management capabilities. It also offers personalized support and integrates into existing customer relationship management (CRM) systems.
Consistent Strong Contenders
While some vendors advanced to leadership, several others remained solidly positioned as strong contenders. SMG, Alida, SurveySparrow, Upland, Eloquant, Tivian, and Alchemer remained contenders for two consecutive years. The following sections will highlight some of the strengths and capabilities that justify their positioning as strong contenders.
SMG and Alida focus on providing actionable customer insights and employee experience feedback. They have a balanced approach to collecting and analyzing data across multiple touchpoints. SMG’s platform also offers customizable features and intuitive dashboards, which improve performance monitoring and data-driven decision-making. Alida’s community feature provides a space for customers to share their experiences and feedback, which helps build a stronger connection between the brand and customers.
SurveySparrow’s VoC platform offers automation capabilities that help set up workflows that are triggered by specific events, which streamlines the entire feedback collection process. The platform also integrates with many third-party apps and focuses on data compliance and security, which helps build customer trust.
Upland offers enterprise-grade feedback solutions and focuses on B2B use cases. Its VoC platform, aptly named Rant & Rave, has an advanced analytics engine powered by ML, which provides deep insights into customer behavior and sentiment.
Eloquant offers tools that enable multi-channel communication, helping companies reach customers on their preferred platforms, subsequently driving engagement and increasing satisfaction.
Tivian’s platform uses advanced analytics and AI to convert raw data into actionable insights, which helps businesses make strategic improvements. It helps businesses capture customer feedback from multiple touchpoints through its comprehensive survey capabilities.
Alchemer allows businesses to tailor surveys in accordance with their specific needs. Its embedded surveys also help organizations increase response rates. It also integrates with various enterprise systems, including marketing tools, enterprise resource planning (ERP), and CRM.
New Strong Contenders
SurveyMonkey, Zoho, and evaluagent, which were not included in the 2023 graph, were positioned as strong contenders in the 2024 SPARK Matrix. SurveyMonkey is well-known for collecting structured feedback. It also offers an intuitive survey design and is easy to use and flexible, which explains why it has a broad user base.
Zoho offers customizable survey options. Its VoC platform helps businesses collect feedback from multiple sources, including live chat, social media, and email, which provides a holistic view of customer sentiments.
evaluagent provides detailed insights into customer interactions and agent performance. The platform’s real-time feedback mechanisms and AI-driven analytics help businesses make continuous improvements in service delivery.
PG Forsta, a leader in 2023, was placed as a Strong Contender in the 2024 SPARK Matrix. Its platform combines customer experience with survey data, which provides users with a comprehensive view of customer sentiment. Its change in position could be due to its limitations in real-time sentiment analysis.
A Few Things Changed in 2024… and Some Didn’t
Vendors like Momentive, Cisco Webex XM, and CX Index were included in the SPARK Matrix in 2023, but not in 2024. This could be owing to strategic shifts or focus away from core VoC capabilities.
CustomerGauge maintained its position as an Aspirant. While it continues to evolve, it is yet to make a significant impact in terms of technology excellence and customer impact compared to its more established counterparts.
Last Word
The VoC industry continues to evolve, with vendors increasingly focusing on providing AI-driven insights and real-time, multichannel feedback management. VoC vendors help businesses collect data and turn them into strategic insights, which help drive customer satisfaction and loyalty.