Analysis · · 6 min read
A customer feedback report template that gets read
How to write a monthly customer feedback report: the answer first, findings with evidence, charts that earn their place, quoted replies, actions with owners.
Most customer feedback reports are long, late and unread. They open with a methodology note, move through fifteen charts in the order the survey asked its questions, and end with a page of quotes nobody selected for a reason. By the time anyone reaches a finding, they have stopped reading.
A good report is short, opens with the answer, and ends with named people doing specific things. This guide sets out a template for a monthly customer feedback report, section by section, with notes on what to leave out.
Who the report is for
Write for one reader: the person who decides what changes next month. For a single hotel that is the general manager; for a group it may be the operations director; for a small business it is the owner.
That reader wants to know three things:
- Is anything wrong that wasn't wrong last month?
- Is anything we changed working?
- What should we do now?
Everything in the report should help answer one of those questions. If a section doesn't, cut it or move it to an appendix.
The template, in order
| Section | Length | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| The short answer | 3–5 sentences | What happened and what to do, for someone who reads nothing else |
| Key figures | One small table | Context: volume, ratings, recommend score, against last month |
| Findings | 3–5 findings, a short paragraph each | What changed, with a chart and replies as evidence |
| Actions | A short list | What will be done, by whom, by when |
| Follow-up on last month | A few lines | Did last month's actions work? |
| Appendix (optional) | As needed | Full topic list, method notes |
Aim for one to two pages, excluding any appendix.
1. The short answer
Start with the conclusion. Three to five sentences that would be enough on their own if the reader stopped there.
A hypothetical example for a 60-cover restaurant:
Feedback held steady overall in September, but complaints about waiting for the bill grew from a small topic to one of the biggest, almost entirely on Friday and Saturday evenings. Praise for the new autumn menu is strong and growing. We recommend adding a card machine for the terrace and keeping the menu as it is.
Notice what it does: it names the change, says how confident we are, gives the good news as well as the bad, and ends with a recommendation. It doesn't say "this report examines feedback received between...".
Write this section last, once you know what the findings are, but put it first.
2. Key figures
A small table of the handful of numbers your reader watches every month, each with last month's figure beside it:
- Number of replies and reviews received
- Average rating
- Recommend score
- Share of replies with a negative mention of any kind
Keep it to one table. These numbers give context; they are not the findings. A steady average rating often hides real movement underneath, which is what the next section is for.
3. Findings
This is the body of the report: three to five findings, ranked by importance, not by where the question appeared on the survey.
A finding is a change, stated plainly, with evidence. Good findings tend to be one of these:
- A topic whose share of conversation grew or shrank noticeably.
- A topic whose tone turned better or worse.
- A topic that appeared for the first time.
- A difference between locations, customer types or channels.
For each finding, include four things:
- A headline sentence that states the finding. "Complaints about bill waiting times grew sharply on weekend evenings."
- The number. Share of replies mentioning the topic this month and last month, and how the tone moved. Use share, not raw counts: if you got more replies this month, every topic will look bigger.
- One chart, if it helps. See below.
- Two or three real replies. Quoted exactly, chosen because they are typical, not because they are the most dramatic.
Then one line on what it means or what to do.
If you need help getting from raw replies to topics and shares, our guide to analysing open-ended survey responses covers the method.
Charts that earn their place
Every chart should support a finding. If you can't say in one sentence what a chart shows, leave it out.
Charts that usually earn their place:
- A topic's share over several months. A simple line shows whether something is a blip or a trend.
- Tone split for a topic, this month against last. Two stacked bars, positive against negative, make a change in tone obvious.
- Locations side by side on one topic. For groups, a row per location makes the gap visible. See comparing feedback across locations.
Charts that usually don't:
- A pie chart of every topic.
- A word cloud.
- A bar chart for every survey question, in survey order.
- Anything that needs a paragraph to explain.
Give every chart a title that says what is measured ("Share of replies mentioning bill waiting time, by month"), and label the axes.
Quoting replies well
Quotes are what make a report believable. A number says complaints grew; a customer saying "we waited twenty minutes to pay and nearly missed our train" makes the reader feel it.
A few rules:
- Quote exactly. Fix nothing except obvious typos, and remove names or personal details.
- Choose typical replies. If you pick only the angriest, readers will either over-react or stop trusting the quotes.
- Show both sides when a topic is mixed. One positive and one negative reply on the same topic is often more useful than three of the same.
- Keep them short. Trim to the sentence that matters.
4. Actions
Every report should end with what will happen. For each action, write:
| Action | Owner | By when | How we'll know it worked |
|---|---|---|---|
| Add a card machine for the terrace | Restaurant manager | 15 October | Share of bill-waiting complaints falls in November |
| Keep the autumn menu through November | Head chef | Ongoing | Menu praise stays steady |
The last column matters most. It turns the next report into a test: did the change move the topic? Without it, actions get done and forgotten.
Keep the list short. Two or three actions that happen beat ten that don't.
5. Follow-up on last month
A few lines checking last month's actions against this month's feedback. "We added a second person at the bar on Fridays in August. Complaints about drink waiting times fell from one of the top topics to a minor one." Or, just as usefully: "No change yet; we'll check again next month."
This section is what turns a series of reports into a record of what worked. For more on this, see closing the feedback loop.
Keeping it to a page or two
The report will try to grow. Resist it:
- Cap the findings at five. If you have more, the least important ones go in the appendix.
- One chart per finding at most.
- Put the full topic list in an appendix, not the body.
- Cut anything that is unchanged and unremarkable. "Parking was mentioned in a similar share of replies as last month" is not a finding.
A good test: could the reader take in the short answer and the actions in two minutes? If yes, the report is doing its job.
Doing this with Userforms
In Userforms, each form writes its own report: the short answer first, then each finding with the chart and the replies behind it and what to do about it. You can print it, share it, or issue it as the month's record. For a form shared across several locations, the report compares the locations.
The findings come from the same analysis that drives the dashboard: every reply and review filed into topics with a tone per mention, compared with the previous period by share of conversation and tone.
You can start for free, or see what each plan includes on the pricing page.