A recent report prepared by StollzNow Research and commissioned by RightNow®
Technologies, a provider of on demand customer relationship management
(CRM) software solutions, has confirmed what anyone whos been on the other end of atrocious customer service already know: the
impact of a poor customer experience can directly affect a company’s
bottom line.

In March 2008, 1,031 research participants in Australia and New Zealand
were asked about their experience in dealing with companies in the
telecommunications, utilities, insurance, online retail, internet
service provider (ISP), travel and hospitality, and finance industries. More than half of the consumers surveyed in a new customer experience report have ceased buying products and services from a company due to poor customer service and a high number felt that the supplier didn’t know it had lost their business. Only half of the companies aware of the loss of business had attempted to win the business back, the survey found.

The telecommunications industry was the worst offender with 62% of respondents indicating they had experienced poor service. Next were ISPs with 52%, followed by finance (46%), travel and hospitality (31%), online retail (30%), and insurance and utilities (28%).

A high proportion of respondents (65%) indicated they had stopped doing business with a telecommunications provider due to poor customer service, and 44% believed their provider hadn’t realised they were no longer a customer. Other industries also have issues.

“Today, the success of every business depends on good customer experiences,” said Brett Waters, Vice President Asia Pacific South, RightNow. “Consumers are much more attuned to what is, and what isn’t, acceptable behaviour when they interact with organisations and are increasingly prepared to remove their business because of poor experiences. Companies need to wise-up to the correlation between poor customer experiences and churn – if you can’t make it easy and satisfying for people to do business with you, you’ll lose them to someone who does – and quickly.”

Finally, on a lighter note, the survey also found that almost one third of Australians would rather go to the dentist for a tooth extraction than suffer a poor customer experience!

The Newshound asks: how is it possible that companies could invest so much money in products and services and then abandon their customers where it matters most! The Newshound doesnt care about the months in R&D, the new distribution deals or any of that. The Newshound just wants to have a great customer experience every time. Is that so much to ask?

Apparently.