I recently downloaded music from a well-known provider.  As a customer, I've seen the music provider evolve in its customer service.  However, after a recent download, I was prompted to provide feedback to the customer service department.  While I am not one for opting into anything ongoing, I thought this was a really clever way to get valuable customer feedback from a range of users.

Ongoing surveys create a panel of customers that a company can easily tap into. This company is really smart to ask customers to help improve its service through regular feedback.  In this way, the customers control when they log into the music provider but they have been pre-screened for providing feedback that can help improve the customer service.

This feedback method allows you to get rapid feedback.  By asking customers to opt into an ongoing survey, you can get immediate feedback about your product as you make adjustments to the user experience or product offerings on a consistent basis, allowing you to continue to improve and measure what you have.

Ongoing surveys allows a natural flow of customers to come into and out of providing survey feedback, which keeps the survey feedback fresh.  Panels of customers can mean that much of your feedback seems static.  Having a fluid customer survey base averts this issue.