Increasingly, the marketing landscape is undergoing continuous change. Empowered consumers, the Internet and technology are some of the significant forces shaping this new landscape.

Marketing or purchasing funnels have been replaced by more descriptive and relevant customer journeys. Brands that hope to compete in this new environment are facing unprecedented challenges.

Managing customer relationships across multiple platforms, responding to requests, complaints, and suggestions, remembering behaviors and preferences, and empowering colleagues to quickly respond to a wide variety of issues are just a few of these challenges.

Sometimes it helps to simply let the data do the talking for us. I’ve seen other posts offer a list of stats, and these are interesting, however, they can be overwhelming.

The stats that follow have been grouped into nine categories. These categories are not mutually exclusive. Some of these stats could easily fit into other categories. There isn’t anything magical about these categories, no doubt you can think of others. I hope you will suggest others in the comments below. Although a number of these statistics reference customer service, I trust we all recognize that customer service is a subset of the broader customer experience.

Rather than quibble over the categories, I would like to challenge us to look for the stories being told by these facts. Many of these stats aren’t new.

LOYALTY

It is 6-7X more expensive for companies to attract new customers than to keep existing customers.*

There are 3.3 billion loyalty program memberships in the US, an average of 29 per household. Source: Colloquy

Of the total memberships in loyalty programs, 58% don’t actively participate in those memberships. Source Colloquy.

86% of marketers ranked mobile loyalty campaigns as very effective or effective. Source Salesforce

LISTENING AND RESPONDING

70% of companies that deliver best in class customer experience use customer feedback – versus industry average of 50% and 29% for lagards.*

Companies who implement regular employee feedback have turnover rates that are 14.9% lower than for employees who receive no feedback. Source: Gallup

55% of customer requests for service on social media are not acknowledged.*

CUSTOMER SERVICE

85% of customer churn due to poor service was preventable.*

67% of customer churn is preventable if the customer issue is resolved at the first engagement.*

66% of consumers who switched brands did so because of poor service.*

82% of consumers say the number one factor that leads to a great customer service experience is having their issues resolved quickly. Source: LivePerson’s Connecting with Consumers Report

CUSTOMER BEHAVIOR

55% of consumers are willing to pay more for a guaranteed good experience.*

86% of consumers are willing to pay more for an upgraded experience.*

13% of frustrated customers tell 15 or more people they are unhappy.*

72% of consumers will share a positive experience with 6 or more people.*

91% of unhappy customers who are non-complainers simply leave.*

43% of U.S. and U.K. decision makers believe a suboptimal digital experience has an effect on digital conversion rates.**

33% of U.S. and U.K. decision makers believe a suboptimal digital customer experience prevents customers from buying from them in the future.**

69% of consumers said rewards make them more likely to shop with a brand. Source: Cherry London

By 2020, the customer will manage 85% of its relationship with an enterprise without interaction with a human. Gartner

71% of customers say that valuing their time is the most important thing a company can do to provide good service. Source: Forrester

MOBILE BEHAVIOR

40% of U.S./U.K. decision makers believe the transition to mobile access and its effect on usability and sales is a barrier to a greater understanding of the digital customer experience.**

59% of customers are adopting mobile technologies worldwide.*

Almost 62% of companies think mobile customer service is a competitive differentiator. Source: ICIM 2013 research report.

75% of consumers think companies should make answers to all their common questions available via smartphones. Source: synthetix

56% of all customer interactions happen during a multi-channel journey. Source: McKinsey.

EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT

42% of service agents are unable to efficiently resolve customer issues due to disconnected systems, archaic user interfaces, and multiple applications. Source: Forrester

Customer retention rates are 18% higher on average when employees are highly engaged. Source Cvent

80% of employees dissatisfied with their direct manager are disengaged. Source: Dale Carnegie Employee Engagement study

35% of US Managers are engaged in their jobs. Source: Gallup State of the American Manager

Managers account for 70% of the variance in employee engagement scores across business units. Source: Gallup.

Globally only 13% of employees are engaged in their jobs. Source: Gallup

50.3% of US employees are “not engaged”, 16.8% are “actively disengaged” Source: Gallup

Employees who say their organizational values are “known and understood” are 51 times more likely to be fully engaged than an employee who responds that their organization does not have values that are known and understood Source: Modern Survey

SOCIAL MEDIA & CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE

84% of social media service interactions are escalated to other channels.*

72% of Facebook interactions are never completed, in any channel.*

13% of companies claim 25% of service requests start socially.*

Here are are some other insights that are specific to bloggers from Kristen Matthews.

THE BOTTOM LINE

Customer experience leader’s stock outperforms the S&P 500 index by 35% and beat customer experience laggards by almost 80%. 2015 Watermark Consulting Study

5% to 95% – the amount of increased profits that can come from boosting customer retention rates by as little as 5 percent. Source: Frederick Reichheld of Bain & Company

U.S. brands lose approximately $41 billion each year due to poor customer service. Source: Bain & Co.

When companies engage and respond to customer service requests over social media, those customers spend 20% to 40% more money with the company than other customers do. Source: Bain & Co.

Companies that increase their number of talented managers and double the rate of engaged employees achieve, on average, 147% higher earnings per share than their competition. Source: Gallup

Organizations that have over 50% employee engagement retain over 80% of their customers Source: Demand Metric

Increasing employee engagement investment by 10% can increase profits by $2,400 per employee, per year. Source: Workplace Research Foundation

GAPS

95% of companies fail to exceed the expectations of their customers.***

29% of companies fail to meet the customer service expectations of their customers.***

81% of companies say they are close to having a holistic view of their customers, but only 37% of consumers say their favorite retailer understands them. Source: IBM Commerce

THE MARKETER’S PERSPECTIVE

92% of organizations that view customer experience as a differentiator offer multiple contact channels. Source Deloitte.

63% of customer experience decision-makers think the importance of the customer experience has risen. Source: Forrester Research

78% of marketing professionals say they “try to differentiate through customer experience.”*

THE NEW YEAR AHEAD

According to the Watermark study companies with a differentiating customer experience enjoy higher revenue due to better retention, less price sensitivity so they sell more to their customers over a longer period of time. They generate more positive word-of-mouth conversations.

The research and writing of this post has helped stimulated some new thinking, I hope it will do the same for you. While I didn’t intend this to be a 2016 trends post, I am sure you’ll see plenty of these soon enough, I would encourage you to take some time to reflect on these various data points and see what kind of insights you can glean for you or your clients.

Speaking of 2016 trends, my friend, Raymond Morin, has some ideas about influencer trends to help get you started.

Please add to these with your thoughts and stats in the comments below.

*ThinkJar annual survey and associated ThinkJar research.
** UserReplay. “The Online Customer Experience: Counting the Cost of Not Knowing.” Oct 21, 2015
*** American Express 2014 Global Customer Service Barometer