Study Reveals Consumer Expectations for Customer Care Continue to Soar Despite Economy

According to RightNow’s third annual Customer Experience Impact Report conducted by Harris Interactive, consumer demand for positive customer experiences continues to rise despite a tight U.S. economy. In fact, 87 percent of consumers have stopped doing business with an organization after a bad customer experience, up from 80 percent in 2007 and 68 percent in 2006. The report also found that:

--58 percent of U.S. consumers said that in a down economy, they will always or often pay more for a better customer experience.

--When recommending a company, outstanding customer service is more important (58 percent) than low prices (44 percent) and top quality products/services (43 percent).

Impact of Negative Customer Experiences

While consumers are willing to recommend organizations and companies to others because of outstanding service, they are almost twice as likely to tell others about poor treatment.

--84 percent of consumers indicated they would tell others about a bad experience – up from 74 percent in 2007 and 67 percent in 2006.

--In addition, blogging about a negative customer experience is on the rise: 22 percent of consumers this year have posted negative feedback about a company, vs. only 13 percent in 2007.

--However, in some ways, men and women react quite differently following a negative customer experience. While men are more likely to react angrily or physically by swearing or hitting something (5 percent of males vs. 1 percent of females), the female tendency is to react emotionally by crying (9 percent of females vs. 2 percent of males) or getting a headache (11 percent vs. 2 percent, respectively).

Also interesting to note, even with the exploding popularity of social networking and mobile technology, when asked how companies can improve their customer experience to encourage consumer spending:

--Only 5 percent of consumers said the “delivery of tailored information via mobile technology” would help.

--Only 4 percent said they wanted organizations to “increase their presence on social networking sites like Facebook, etc.

--Even those aged 18-34 didn’t demand this type of engagement with great frequency – opting instead for better access to agents. Tailored information via mobile technology, as well as presence on social networking sites were both selected by 9% of respondents in this age group, respectively.

The survey also found that, when interacting with organizations online, 51 percent of consumers want the option of a live web chat session, a similar rate as in 2007.

More information on the service and support industry can be found at www.SupportIndustry.com