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Customer satisfaction Despite all the effort and money poured intoCX tools by companies, customer satisfaction continues to decline. In theUnited States, it is now at its lowest level in nearly two decades, per datafrom the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI). Consumer sentiment isalso at its lowest in more than two decades. This negative dynamic in thecustomer-centric ecosystem in which we now live creates the challenge offiguring out what is going wrong and what companies can do to fix it. The short answer is that companies need tocreate an amazing customer experience. Customers no longer only comparecompanies to their competitors. They compare with the best companies and brandsacross industries. But satisfaction across the board is in decline! That begsthe question: What customer satisfaction areas should companies tacklestrategically to create greater profit at lower risk? We base our answer on research at the ACSI —analyzing millions of customer data points — and research that we conducted forour book, The Reign of the Customer: Customer-Centric Approaches to ImprovingCustomer Satisfaction. For three decades, the ACSI has been a leadingsatisfaction index (cause-and-effect metric) connected to the quality of brandssold by companies with significant market share in the United States. Here are the top 10 areas to focus on tosatisfy customers and create greater profit at lower risk: Customer Satisfaction is a Strategic Asset The American Customer Satisfaction Indexdefines customer satisfaction as a strategic company asset that should beoptimized. Satisfaction should not be maximized but also not ignored;optimization is the key. Companies thrive by delivering on customers’ satisfaction expectations in combinationwith quality, value, and complaint handling. The focus should then be to managethe optimization of satisfaction relative to customer expectations and companyresources used. It is important to understand thisoptimization of customer satisfaction since there is a complicated — and ultimatelynegative — relationship between satisfaction and market share. That is, whilehigh and improving satisfaction in smaller companies drives market-sharegrowth, maintaining high satisfaction once the market share is larger becomesmore difficult. This is because with a larger market share typically comes amore heterogeneous customer base and more diverse customer behaviors, whichmakes delivering high satisfaction more difficult. Understand What Customers Expect What type of demands do customers have relative to their experiences with companies? Let ' s start with the misnomer of sky-rocketing expectations. For the past 12 years, using ACSI data, customer expectations have been relatively steady at the macro level (across industries and companies), scoring between 79 and 82 on a 100-point scale (where 100 represents the highest expectations). Now, companies in the auto industry like BMW, Mercedes, and Toyota, seemingly always have much higher expectations than average (>90 ) from their customers that they have to manage. Despite the steady cross-industry expectations, the popular choice for many businesses is to aim higher and higher, and at least to“ always exceed customer expectations.” Is this the future trend in customer expectations? Practically, it is a flawed argument since companies should avoid promising to“ always exceed expectations,” as attempting such a strategy is not sustainable. Companies can and should delight the customer with an amazing experience but with realistic aims. Quality Performance Matters How have customers ' quality perceptions evolved (brands, products, and services)? Important in this context is what constitutes quality. Quality, as measured within the ACSI, refers to reliability and customization, but customization dominates reliability. the macro-level, for the past 12 years quality has been residing in the 79 to 83 range on a 100-point scale (where 100 is the highest quality). For example, Quaker has impressive scores on overall quality, with BMW and Publix peaking in product and service quality, respectively. A key issue moving forward is likely to be strategies for improving satisfaction in the absence of gains in perceived quality for many companies. Contrary to what managers often think, quality trumps price. More broadly, quality also trumps value as a driver of customer fact ros satis most economic sectors and industries. Plus, we live in a“ mass customization” economy, which is reflected in satisfaction being more sensitive to the personalizability than the reliability of products and services.
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