Customer Experience Matters

I recently published a research report called What Consumers Want From Insurers that examined what consumers cared about the most when it came to their insurance providers. In our analysis of survey responses from nearly 5,000 US consumers, we found that consumers most want:

• a good reputation from life insurers
• low prices from auto/home insurers
• high quality coverage from health insurers

We took the analysis one step further and looked at how responses differed across five generations of consumers: Gen Y (18 to 27), Gen X (28 to 41), Younger Boomers (42 to 51), Older Boomers (52 to 62), and Seniors (63 and older). It turns out that Younger Boomers care the most about the actual coverage. Here are some other interesting factoids that we found:

• Life insurers: Gen X wants low prices, Younger Boomers want good coverage, and older consumers want a good reputation.
• Auto/home insurers: Young consumers want low prices, Younger Boomers want good coverage, and older consumers want good service.
• Health insurers: Gen Y and Seniors wants good service, Gen X wants low prices, and Boomers want good coverage.

The bottom line: Insurers need generational-specific strategies.

In my research report called How Consumers Research, Buy, And Get Service, we looked at which channels US consumers prefer to use for getting customer service support. Here’s what we found:

• Speaking to a rep over the phone (45%)
• Going to a store/branch (36%)
• Sending an email (6%)
• Using a Web site (5%)
• Online chatting with a rep (3%)
• Using an automated phone app (2%)

As you can see, consumers overwhelmingly prefer in-person interactions; 81% chose either a phone rep or a store employee for customer service support. That’s why I said in a post that we won’t see self-service replace customer service anytime soon.

I also analyzed customer service preferences by generation and found that:

• For every generation except Seniors (63+ years old), the phone is the most popular option. Seniors are most interested in going to a store.
• Gen Xers (28 to 41) are the group most enamored with using email and have the lowest interest in going into a store.
• Gen Yers (18 to 27) are the group most interested in the Web and online chatting.
• Younger Boomers (42 to 51) are the group most interested in using phone self-service applications.

The bottom line: Great customer service is often just a phone call away.

In a recent post, I introduced “ACES” an an acronym for the elements of great customer service (and, by the way, customer experience is NOT disappearing). Based on feedback to that post (thanks Justin), I’ve decided to specifically add “responsiveness” to the mix, instead of considering responsiveness within other items (which is what I was doing in ACES). So there’s now an “R’ in the new and improved acronym “CARES“ which stands for:

• Communication (clearly communicate the process and set expectations)
• Accountability (take responsibility for fixing the problem or getting an answer)
• Responsiveness (don’t make the customer wait for your communication or a solution)
• Empathy (acknowledge the impact that the situation has on the customer)
• Solution (at the end of the day, make sure to solve the issue or answer the question)

The bottom line: Your customers should think that your company CARES.

I recently published a report called How Consumers Research, Buy, And Get Service that looked at data from nearly 5,000 U.S. consumers. We asked consumers about the channels they use when researching, buying, and getting customer service. As part of the analysis, I compared the data to a survey that we did in late 2005. Here’s some of what we found:

• In-store satisfaction continues to dominate. In 2005, consumers were the most satisfied with in-store interactions for researching, buying, and getting service. The same is true in 2007. Satisfaction rates for in-store interactions also increased over the last two years, making the largest jump in customer service.
• Web site satisfaction increased, but only slightly for researching. Consumers were more satisfied with the Web for all three types of interactions in 2007 than they were in 2005. But the increase in satisfaction rates for research, was much lower than it was for buying or getting service.
• Email satisfaction is on the rise. For all three activities, consumers were considerably more satisfied in 2007 than they were in 2005. Satisfaction rates went up 10% for researching, 13% for buying, and 14% for getting customer service.
• Phone self-service remains a problem. In 2005, the satisfaction rates for phone self-service lagged behind most of the other channels. But the problem has actually gotten worse. While satisfaction rates have mostly increased for all channels over the last two years, consumers are actually slightly less satisfied with phone self-service for researching and buying.

The bottom line: Your front-line employees matter; treat them well.

Time Magazine just published “10 Ideas That Are Changing The World.” One of the items on the list was ‘The End of Customer Service.” The article describes the rise of self-service technologies like airport kiosks, pump-your-own gas, and new wireless capabilities as the end to human-assisted service.

My take: I disagree. There’s no question that self-service is on the rise and that consumers will be doing more things via the Web, phones, kiosks, and other devices. Consumers can handle many of these simple interactions on their own; often times as well as, or maybe even better than, going through another person.

But does that mean that customer service is dead? No! The following five issues will ALWAYS keep human-assisted service alive:

1. Some interactions are too emotional
2. Some topics are too complicated
3. Some self-service is not easy to use
4. Some people can’t self-serve
5. Some people don’t want to self-serve

Given the push for self-service, though, there’s an opportunity for companies to differentiate themselves by going against the tide and beefing-up their human assistance. That’s why I defined “service infusion” and “service amplification” as two of the five disruptive customer experience strategies.

The bottom line: Don’t trash your customer service agents, embrace them.

It seems like there’s a surge of customer service activity; I’ve been getting a lot of requests (from clients and press) on the topic. Here’s why I think it’s so hot:

• The Web has heightened expectations of self-service and responsiveness
• Call center technologies make it easier for agents to solve problems (but not every company uses it equally well)
• Many of customers’ ”moments of truth” occur during customer service
• There are many potential miscues that can create poor experiences
• People used to tell 10 people about a bad experience, now they can post a blog or a video on YouTube and tell thousands (or more) people

So what can companies do to improve customer service? ACES. This is an acronym that I just developed (this week) for the four key things that companies need to design into their customer service interactions:

• Accountability (take responsibility for fixing the problem)
• Communication (clearly communicate the process and set expectations)
• Empathy (acknowledge the impact that the situation has on the customer)
• Solution (at the end of the day, make sure to solve the problem)

The bottom line: Your customers deserve nothing less than ACES.

Addendum (4/17): Based on the comment from Justin, I’ve updated the acronym from ACES to CARES. So I guess I was wrong, something is better than ACES.

I just ran across an article on CRM Daily called “Customer Service’s Gap Between Intention and Reality” that starts as follows:

When it comes to looking after our customers, quite often there is a gap — a huge gap — between theory and practice.

My take:  Let me start by saying that I don’t believe that there is a gap between theory and practice. That’s because there are, in fact, many gaps. I took a quick stab at highlighting 6 major customer experience gaps.

Why is this detail important? Because you can’t systematically solve customer issues until you understand exactly which gap(s) have the problem.

The bottom line: Don’t let your customer experience get lost in the gaps.