The Satisfaction Quarterly Report, Q2 2008

The American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) just released its Q2 2008 report that covers the following sectors: Internet news & information, portals & search engines, automotive, electronics, major appliances, and personal computers. As I mentioned in a previous post about the ACSI, it’s a great research effort that doesn’t gets enough visibility.

Here are some highlights of the new data:

Ratings Of Firms

• Top rated: Toyota and BMW
• Top rated relative to industry average: Apple and Google
• Largest improvement (since last year): Google and Apple
• Lowest rated: AOL and HP
• Lowest rated relative to industry average: AOL, Chrysler Jeep, and Ask.com
• Largest decline (since last year): Whirlpool and HP

Ratings Of Industries

• Top rated: Electronics
• Largest improvement (since last year): Internet Portals & Search Engines
• Lowest rated: Personal Computers
• Largest decline (since last year): Major Appliances

While it’s interesting to look at the data, I also like to read the commentary by Professor Claes Fornell who puts the customer satisfaction results in context of the overall economy. Here’s an excerpt from his Q2 2008 comments:

Future consumption growth is impeded by many factors, chief among them house-price deflation (which has trimmed household wealth), tougher credit conditions, a worsening labor market, and continued high fuel and food prices… Under these circumstances, even if customer satisfaction were rising, it would be difficult to offset pocketbook limitations. But since ACSI shows no aggregate growth, the outlook for more aggregate spending growth continues to be bleak… The ACSI forecast suggests a third quarter spending growth of no more than 2.3% and the economy will continue to struggle… But all is not doom and gloom. E-business and technology lead the way. Customer satisfaction for e-business is up by almost 6%.

The bottom line: Satisfaction may be down, but Apple and Google are doing something right