Why customer service mustn’t stop in a recession
The folly of this attitude is shown by some recent international research from American Express, neatly summarised in this infographic on the Get Satisfaction blog. Looking at the attitudes of consumers in ten countries, including the UK, it analysed their attitudes towards customer service against a backdrop of current poor economic conditions.
The key finding is that good customer service is even more vital than ever before. 61% of global respondents said that it is more, not less, important today to be treated well while nine out of ten consumers said that they are more likely to purchase if they receive good service. Proof that whatever the economic conditions service is central to creating happy customers and increased revenues.
But consumers feel they are being short-changed by businesses. Only 21% of British respondents felt that companies had increased their focus on customer service and a damning 28% thought that businesses were paying less attention to them.
And in case businesses think these are just idle complaints, nearly 80% of British consumers stated that they hadn’t completed a transaction due to poor customer service. It is worth just stopping and thinking about this – these are people that want to buy from you, but have walked away when on the point of purchasing. Not only are these lost revenues in terms of sales, but all the marketing efforts used to drive them to your site or shop have also been wasted.
As well as losing money the advent of social media means that poor service will be broadcast widely. While Britons tell less people about poor service (an average of 13 friends against a whopping 35 in Australia), 95% of us say that we either share our bad experiences all or some of the time. Proof indeed that during a recession, companies need to be increasing not cutting their investment in customer service, if they want to successfully make it out the other side.
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