The Customer Service Survey
VocaLabs' weblog providing news and commentary on the challenges of providing good customer service.
The Disconnect About Unhappy Customers
Thursday - October 06, 2005 01:19 PM in
I mentioned in my last posting attending a SOCAP breakfast (Society of Consumer Affairs Professionals). Scott Broetzmann of Customer Care Measurement and Consulting made a presentation using parts of several different customer satisfaction studies to make his point that the face of the customer is changing and that the call center needs to adjust to the new reality in order to provide good service. While my first note discussed one point on which we diverged, VocaLabs research agrees with the findings Scott presented 99%+ of the time. And some of the data is especially revealing.
Let me back up a step. When I first joined VocaLabs and was on a learning curve about measuring ease of use and caller satisfaction issues, one of the first articles I came across was in a SOCAP publication. By Bell and Zemke, the title was "The Myth of The Satisfied Customer". It was an eye opener in how the article emphasized the broad disconnect between how a company views a satisfied customer (as something to brag about), while satisfied in the mind of the consumer is a neutral to modestly negative rating. That theme has been central to many of the talks and sales presentations I've made since.
Scott added a new wrinkle to this truth that I wanted to share. Drawing from a recent SOCAP commissioned study (which is for sale); dissatisfied customers were asked to check responses from a list of what they wantedfrom a contact that would presumably make them satisfied. And elsewhere these same people were asked what they actually got. Remember, the complaining customer was to check all the items they wanted from the contact, so totals are much greater than 100%.
The most often cited request (73%) was to receive an explanation of why the problem occurred. But only 18% actually got an explanation. 72% wanted the product repaired or service fixed, but only 27% reported getting it. 71% wanted to be thanked for their business; 25% actually got a thanks. 70% wanted an assurance the problem would not re-occur. 16% got such assurance. 59% wanted an apology; 25% got one. Not surprisingly, 59% also wanted a chance to vent and 47% got it (one presumes because the hapless agent took the brunt of the customers anger). There were other categories, but the result is clear. Whatever a company thinks they are doing to mollify unhappy customers isn't working.
When asking disgruntled customers if they were overall satisfied with the company response to their problem, only 1% said the company went beyond their expectations! Only 18% called themselves completely satisfied, and 19% while not completely satisfied found the company's action acceptable. And at the other end of the scale nearly 1/3 (32%) of customers reported they were not at all satisfied and that no action was taken as a result of their complaint!
As Peter is fond of mentioning, just as everyone thinks they are above average drivers, call center management tends to think they are doing ok and that it's the other guy who isn't serving their customers well. Yah, right.
Posted by Rick Rappe
Scott added a new wrinkle to this truth that I wanted to share. Drawing from a recent SOCAP commissioned study (which is for sale); dissatisfied customers were asked to check responses from a list of what they wantedfrom a contact that would presumably make them satisfied. And elsewhere these same people were asked what they actually got. Remember, the complaining customer was to check all the items they wanted from the contact, so totals are much greater than 100%.
The most often cited request (73%) was to receive an explanation of why the problem occurred. But only 18% actually got an explanation. 72% wanted the product repaired or service fixed, but only 27% reported getting it. 71% wanted to be thanked for their business; 25% actually got a thanks. 70% wanted an assurance the problem would not re-occur. 16% got such assurance. 59% wanted an apology; 25% got one. Not surprisingly, 59% also wanted a chance to vent and 47% got it (one presumes because the hapless agent took the brunt of the customers anger). There were other categories, but the result is clear. Whatever a company thinks they are doing to mollify unhappy customers isn't working.
When asking disgruntled customers if they were overall satisfied with the company response to their problem, only 1% said the company went beyond their expectations! Only 18% called themselves completely satisfied, and 19% while not completely satisfied found the company's action acceptable. And at the other end of the scale nearly 1/3 (32%) of customers reported they were not at all satisfied and that no action was taken as a result of their complaint!
As Peter is fond of mentioning, just as everyone thinks they are above average drivers, call center management tends to think they are doing ok and that it's the other guy who isn't serving their customers well. Yah, right.
Posted by Rick Rappe
Posted at 01:19 PM by | | | |