Small businesses encouraged to collect customer feedback reported higher revenue and profit than a comparison group in a field experiment in Rwanda.
The research followed 274 retail and service firms that had not previously used formal feedback systems. Businesses asked some customers for their views, then could use what they learned to make changes for everyone.
The Marketing Science study, first published online in 2024, found that monthly revenue was 62% higher and profit 54.5% higher among the firms offered the feedback program than among control firms. The results are comparisons within the experiment, not a forecast for other businesses.
Researcher Rupali Kaul revisited the findings in a 2026 INSEAD analysis, emphasizing the value of acting on what customers say.
Feedback can reach beyond the people asked
Kaul and co-authors Stephen Anderson, Pradeep Chintagunta and Naufel Vilcassim studied firms in Kigali, Muhanga and Musanze. The intervention ran for a year, from September 2020 to August 2021, with follow-up surveys afterward.
Participating firms received a smartphone and an app to collect customer contact details. The feedback group also received tools and prompts to ask selected customers about their experience and suggestions. The comparison group received the contact-collection tools without the feedback prompts.
The researchers found improved outcomes among customers who were not asked for feedback as well as those who were. Their analysis suggests that business changes based on feedback helped produce those wider effects.
For example, if several customers mention a confusing ordering process and a business improves it, later customers may benefit even if they never completed a survey. That example illustrates a possible mechanism; it is not a specific change attributed to a firm in the study.
What the percentages do and do not mean
The results compare groups of small businesses under the conditions of this experiment. The revenue and profit figures are relative percentage differences, not percentage-point changes, and they do not mean that every participating company experienced the same increase.
The firms were recruited in Rwanda and had no formal feedback method or online review presence when selected. Businesses in other countries, larger firms and companies that already collect extensive feedback may respond differently.
The research took place during the pandemic. Its design gives useful evidence about this intervention, but other periods and economic conditions may produce different results.
How a small business can use the idea
Owners can start with a small number of consistent questions: what worked, what did not and what customers would change. They can record recurring themes and compare them with order errors, returns or support requests.
It helps to assign responsibility for a specific improvement and check whether the problem recurs. Asking for suggestions without responding may consume time while leaving the underlying issue untouched.
Customer privacy matters too. Contact information should be collected and used in line with applicable rules and the expectations set when customers share it.
Our guide to using customer reviews explains how to group comments into operational questions. Public reviews are self-selected, so they need not represent all customers.
The Rwanda experiment suggests that even a simple feedback process can produce useful information. Its commercial value depends on what a business learns and whether it can make improvements that customers notice.
