Here’s an interesting article by Christopher Musico about several recent Forrester research studies that show the relationship between customer experience and customer loyalty, Want Customer Loyalty? Improve Customer Experience First:
According to “Customer Experience Spending Intensifies in 2008,” a Forrester study authored Senior Analyst Megan Burns, more than 80 percent of respondents say that improving the usability, usefulness, and enjoyability of the online experience is more important in 2008 than in years past, with the top two spending priorities being Web analytics and customer satisfaction surveys. According to Burns, that one-two finish reflects a growing focus on measuring key components of the customer experience — something she says she finds unsurprising. In fact, she adds, one of the underpinnings of her study was to quantify the rumblings she had been hearing from companies with regard to hard-number results.
Bruce Temkin, a Forrester vice president and principal analyst, customer experience, echoes Burns’ thoughts on the importance of quantifying what customer service personnel were already talking about. Going beyond mere investment projections, Temkin’s study, “The Business Impact of Customer Experience,” concludes that customer experience directly correlates to customer loyalty. Temkin admits the conclusion may seem like a no-brainer, but he claims no quantifiable numbers had ever reinforced the connection. “We’ve taken something that certainly a lot of executives — and clearly just about all customer experience pros — knew, which is that improving the customer experience improves business results,” he explains. “But, in all cases that I’ve seen, people talk about the anecdotal connection between the two. What we’ve done in this report is we’ve quantitatively tied together ‘change of customer experience’ with ‘the change of some loyalty factors.’ “
For more, check out the complete source article.
