Seven mistakes to avoid when you’re working to improve customer understanding

By Ben Perkins, Director of Partnerships & Services

Making sure customers understand your communications isn’t always as simple as it seems.  

When testing understanding of everyday communications such as utility bills, credit card offers and insurance payment options we found that roughly a third or less of people can demonstrate good understanding of the key information.  

After the Plain Numbers Approach was applied, the number of people who understood doubled.  

Many organisations are now focussing on better understanding, not least those regulated by the FCA who are bound by the Customer Understanding Outcome of The Consumer Duty.  

Here are seven key things mistakes to avoid.  

Mistake 1: Not paying attention to the numbers 

It comes naturally to most communicators to think about using plain language, think about the layout and aim for an accessible design. Don’t leave the numbers as just an afterthought. If you’re talking about money or working in financial services, utilities or other essential services your message is likely to be inherently numerical.  

Almost half of all working aged adults in the UK have numeracy skills at primary school levels and at least one in five experience maths anxiety, a negative emotive response to working with numbers. Even those who are comfortable with numbers are unlikely to welcome an unnecessary maths challenge.  

The Plain Numbers Approach puts numbers at its heart and combines the most effective ways to communicate numbers with best practices in language and behavioural science. This approach helps ensure you’re not overwhelming the customers with too many numbers or relying on their maths skills.  

Mistake 2: Mistaking readability for being understandable  

Knowing the Flesch-Kincaid score (or other readability score) for your communication is useful. If it’s too hard to read, it’s likely it will be difficult to understand.  

Having said that, sometimes a good readability score is taken to mean the communication is easy for people to understand. Assuming this would be a mistake.  

Readability scoring only gives you a small part of the picture – ignoring the numbers, the level of familiarity your customers might have with your language and the layout or flow of the communication.  

It’s perfectly possible for a communication to have a good readability score and still be hard to understand.  

Mistake 3: Getting caught with the Curse of Knowledge  

The curse of knowledge is the difficulty that we all have when trying to explain something we know very well in simple terms. It can be difficult for the communicator to remember that others may not share their knowledge or even to imagine what it’s like not to know.  

For example, if you’ve worked in pensions for many years, you’ll know all about compound interest. You’ll probably use that term every day. It becomes natural to use it in your communications and assume that customers will know what you mean, but the reality is likely to be very different.  

Whether you’re talking about excess on insurance, someone’s account being in credit or changes in the Bank of England base rate you’ll need to keep checking in on whether you’re suffering from the curse of knowledge.  

Mistake 4: Not having a good understanding of the communication intent  

One of the quickest paths to confusing your customers is not being clear yourself about the purpose of the message.  

Ask yourself:  What are the aims? What actions do you want the customer to take? What essential information do they truly need? 

Not doing this well risks either losing the key message or overloading the customer with far too much information that could confuse them and make it difficult to find out what they really want and need. 

Mistake 5: Relying too much on AI 

Everyone is talking about AI. Understandably so, because it can be highly effective and efficient. But AI can only be as good as the people using it and focussing on it as the sole answer to customer understanding challenges can cause real problems. This is particularly true when our communications are complex, nuanced or are likely to generate emotion.  

Think of it like Google Translate – a very helpful tool which should be used – but to make sure we’re getting everything right we would still need a skilled translator.  

Make sure your team are confident in best practice and well trained in areas such as Plain Numbers so they can apply the all-important human touch.  

Mistake 6: Not testing for actual customer understanding  

If you don’t get the testing right, you’ll base your decisions on misleading insights.  

Most commonly, if you’re looking to improve customer understanding, it’s essential to test for actual comprehension, not just perceived understanding. Questions like “did you understand this?”, “do you think this is clear?” or “is this easy to understand?” which are often asked in focus groups, only test perceived understanding, not true comprehension.  

The Plain Numbers trials highlighted the stark difference between people's perception and their actual understanding. When asked whether they thought the communication was clear, 6 or 7 in 10 people said yes across all the trials. In every case, actual understanding was much lower when tested with comprehension questions. 

To ensure reliable results, use a robust sample and ask questions that allow people the opportunity to prove they understand, such as “how much did your water cost for this period” or “what is the maximum amount you can claim for on this insurance policy?”  

Mistake 7: Writing for your regulator or your organisation first, not the customer  

What the customer needs to know should be front and centre of your approach. Of course, you need to comply with regulations and meet your organisations aims too, but these considerations should be secondary.  

If the customer isn’t your focus, you risk overwhelming them with irrelevant information, which can lead to confusion and distract from the key messages they need to understand.  Ultimately, it will be harder for them to achieve a good outcome.  

At Plain Numbers, we’re working with dozens of firms across different sectors to help them avoid these mistakes and create communications that more people can understand. This delivers better customer outcomes. Get in touch with us to find out if we can help your team.