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How to Not Lose Customers


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We all know how important it is to satisfy – and ideally delight – our customers. After all, it’s much cheaper and easier for a company to look after and maintain its existing clients than to seek out new ones.

But just how big a deal is it to lose customers? Well, according to a new study by WhiteConcierge, UK companies are losing 20 million customers – equivalent to £3.4 billion – simply through bad customer service. That’s not even taking into account those customers who, for example, have been disappointed by the product itself or are unhappy with the price.

Three out of every four customers questioned in the survey switched at least one product or service in the last two years. More than one in five blamed bad customer service for switching to other finance, telecoms and utilities brands, with insurance and electricity providers faring worst.

At the same time, new YouGov/RightNow research has brought us its customer experience wish list for 2010. To improve customer satisfaction this year, companies should avoid these ‘top customer service wrongs’:
 

  1. Being put on hold for an indefinite amount of time when calling the contact centre (26% of customers are unhappy about this)
  2. Premium rate numbers (0870, etc.) (25%)
  3. Having to make multiple calls or emails to resolve an issue (15%)
  4. Having to repeat yourself to uninformed agents (10%)
  5. Being ‘forced’ to interact with an organisation through their chosen communication channel rather than your preferred channel (8%)
  6. Having to make multiple calls or emails to just find out some information (5%)
  7. Emails that only ever get an automated response with no issue resolution (4%)
  8. Not being able to find the information you need on the company website (3%)

Click here to find out more about our Customer Satisfaction Market Research


This entry was posted on Monday, February 8th, 2010 at 5:11 pm and is filed under Customer Satisfaction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “How to Not Lose Customers”

  1. Curt Says:
    February 15th, 2010 at 6:01 pm

    I was surprised by your statistic that only one and five customers blamed customer service for switching brands. It would be interesting to see if this statistic held true for similar industries outside the UK.
    In the US, service is a primary differentiator for many brands as products have become more commoditized.
    Some interesting insights from Nick Wreden an executive at Fusionbrand regarding the impact of customer satisfaction/disatisfaction:
    A satisfied customer will tell four or five others about a pleasant brand experience. Deliver a poor experience, and seven to 13 others will hear about it. Another study’s scary statistic: Unhappy customers will continue to voice their dissatisfaction for up to 23 years.
    YIKES!

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