The growth of any business is always delicate, especially in the case of small businesses. A lot of your growth will be organic, but there are also a lot of decisions that need to be made.
When deciding to scale, increasing production, hiring more staff, and spending more on marketing will no doubt be among your priorities. However, it’s crucial that you don’t overlook your customer service offering.
Customer satisfaction is a vital component of growth. It helps you to get an edge over your competitors, it converts one-time buyers into loyal customers and it increases brand trust.
Here are 33 data-backed statistics that prove this.
An excellent differentiator for your company
- In light of the Covid-19 pandemic, 58 percent of people said they had higher expectations of customer service than ever before.
- Nine in ten consumers in the US use customer service as a factor in deciding whether to do business with a company - or not.
- Two-thirds of customers would switch brands if they felt like they were being "treated like a number and not an individual".
- Some 59 percent of consumers say that companies don’t offer a “human touch” anymore. Here you could get an edge.
- 90 percent of customers say that getting a response within 10 minutes is “important” or “very important” to them.
- Following a positive experience, 72 percent of customers will tell six or more people about it.
- Good customer service can convert 86 percent of consumers into long-term brand champions.
- 83 percent of customers feel “more loyal” to companies that respond to and resolve their issues.
- For almost three out of five consumers, good customer service is vital if they are to feel loyalty toward a brand.
A great way to increase profits
- An estimated 89 percent of companies perform better financially than their competition if their customer service is "significantly above average".
- Businesses can increase their income by between four and eight percent if they prioritize better customer service.
- Companies with superior customer experience bring in 5.7 times more revenue.
- Businesses that put customers first are 60 percent more profitable than companies that aren’t customer-focused.
- Personalised consumer experiences can improve your online conversion rate by around eight percent.
- Improving customer retention by just five percent can increase profits by between 25 and 95 percent.
- Gaining new customers is between five and 25 times more expensive than it would be to retain existing ones.
- On average, companies that have initiatives to improve customer experience see a 20 percent increase in employee engagement.
- Companies whose employees are engaged can outperform their competition by almost 150 percent.
Avoid long-term damage to your company’s reputation
- Sixty percent of customers won’t do business with a brand again after one poor customer service experience.
- That said, 67 percent can be convinced otherwise if the issue is resolved during their first interaction.
- Nearly 80 percent of consumers will forgive a bad experience if they consider the company’s customer service to be “very good” overall.
- This is compared to just one in five if it is considered “very poor”.
- Customers tell an average of 16 people about a negative customer service experience.
- Around 57 percent of customers will abandon their purchases if they know they’re in for a long wait for an answer from you.
- In the USA, customers who switch companies as a result of poor service come at a cost of $1.6 trillion.
Prioritize modern communication channels
- Companies that have embraced modern communication methods are 26 percent more profitable than their rivals.
- Almost two-thirds of consumers would prefer businesses to contact them via text message.
- 60 percent of retail customers will choose to text instead of contacting a call center.
- Almost two-thirds of US consumers would change to another company if it offered text messaging as a contact method.
- 72 percent of customers would give their custom to a business that offered real-time text chat.
- Instead of email, 60 percent of customers would prefer to receive support through text.
- More than half of consumers are frustrated when they can’t text a business.
- Some 43 percent of clients will choose to text businesses with inquiries or to order or request services.
Superagent, a modern solution for your business
With Superagent, we’ve got you covered.
Our intuitive, easy-to-use help desk is the perfect solution for growing companies that want to harness the potential of delivering good customer service.
Bring together multiple contact methods (including email, SMS, and WhatsApp) into one place and respond quickly to customers on the channel of their choice.
Doing so will improve your customer experience, increase customer satisfaction and ensure that your clients keep coming back.
Download the program here - for desktop or mobile - and get yourself ahead of the competition.