2010 Contact Center Satisfaction Index 
Consumers are increasingly forced to deal with companies remotely through centralized contact centers or the Internet. Although companies continue to offer more online functionality each year, the call center remains the last - and most personalized - option to resolve problems. Thankfully for consumers, the Call Center Satisfaction Index (CCSI) continues to rise, improving 2 points over the past year, and a total of 6 points since 2007.
National Customer Satisfaction Index - UK Results for Q1
After the UK economy shrank by 5% in 2009, there are signs, however small, that better days may lie ahead. In the fourth quarter of 2009, the National Customer Satisfaction Index (NCSI-UK) improved for the first time. The slight gain coincided with the first positive growth for the economy since 2008. In 2010, the Index trends upwards, this time making its largest gain to date, up 0.5% to a score of 73.3 on the NCSI?s 0-100 point scale. This is the highest level for the NCSI since national scores for the economy were first released, and the uptick coincides with a second straight quarter of small, but still positive, GDP growth.
National Customer Satisfaction Index - UK Retail Results for Q4
After three straight quarters of small declines, the National Customer Satisfaction Index (NCSI UK) inches up very slightly for the first time, in the fourth quarter of 2009. The Index improves 0.1% to a score of 72.9 on the NCSI-UK?s 0-100 point index scale. This coincides with a 0.1% fourth quarter growth in GDP, which though rather anaemic by absolute standards, nevertheless represents the first positive growth for the economy since the first quarter of 2008. Retail was among the categories behind the small uptick in GDP, with improving customer satisfaction driving stronger sales - overall, retail sales were up 3.3% compared with the fourth quarter of 2008. Still, consumers have remained cautious amid an uncertain economy. While nearly one quarter planned to spend more during the 2009 holiday shopping season, an equal number indicated they were scaling back their spending, and nearly half of all shoppers planned to put little to none of their holiday purchases on their credit cards.
Customer Satisfaction with UK Financial Services
The National Customer Satisfaction Index (NCSI-UK) drops slightly for a second straight quarter. For the third quarter of 2009, NCSI-UK falls 0.1% to 72.8 on a 100 point scale. The decline is the result of eroding customer satisfaction with companies that provide a range of financial services to consumers. Retail banking, mortgage lending and credit card services all show weakened customer satisfaction, while home and motor insurance remains steady. Even though each quarterly drop at the national level is quite small, the trend is not encouraging for an overall recovery of the UK economy.
In today's competitive marketplace, customer satisfaction is critical to long-term profitability. Customers whose needs and desires remain unmet will take their business - and their wallets - elsewhere. When it comes to financial performance, most companies look hard and often at tangible assets, but the balance sheet neglects their most valuable intangible asset - the customer. Improving financial performance requires understanding current levels of customer satisfaction, what it means for the future, and identifying ways to optimize it profitably.
CFI Group Smartphone Satisfaction Study 2009
We are now in a world of cell phone ubiquity where smartphones represent one of the last remaining areas for growth and expansion for wireless companies. Once the dominion of business users, consumers are adopting smartphones in large numbers. Apple's iPhone is largely credited for spurring consumer interest in smartphones, which are being used more like mini-computers than cell phones.
National Customer Satisfaction Index - UK Results for Q2
The National Customer Satisfaction Index (NCSI-UK) retreats slightly in the second quarter, falling 0.1% to 72.9 on a 100 point scale. The small drop is largely due to declining customer satisfaction with the automobile industry - despite sharply falling sales over the past year, new vehicle purchases still make up a sizeable proportion of overall consumer spending. Customer satisfaction also declines for full-service, sit-down restaurants, but the fast food industry remains flat.
2009 Contact Center Satisfaction Index (CCSI)
In the midst of a recession, companies continue to search for ways to cut costs while maintaining customer satisfaction. This is certainly the case for contact centers, which are challenged to achieve high levels of customer service while operating in a "leaner" manner than ever before.
National Customer Satisfaction Index - UK Results
The National Customer Satisfaction Index (NCSI-UK) releases its annual results for utilities, mobile phone service and airlines as well as the first ever national customer satisfaction score for the UK economy. The national index debuts at 73.0 on the NCSI-UK's 0-100 point scale.
The Cobalt Citizen Satisfaction Survey (CCSS)
Currently, state and local governments across the country are struggling to balance budgets in the face of an economic slowdown, a weakening housing market and rising unemployment, all key factors in the revenue they collect. In the coming months, local governments will be forced to make a number of difficult decisions about how to allocate scarce resources across an array of public programs and services and/or raise taxes to generate more revenue. Incorporating input from community residents into local policy decisions is vital to the democratic process and necessary to ensure a successful program of change. Good government depends on strong public support and a citizenry that is invested in the development and growth of their community.
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State of Texas
1. Get the fundamentals right. With the ever-increasing rate of technological change, companies are more inclined to continually offer bigger, improved, feature-rich products or services, convinced that the latest and greatest will put their customer over the moon. Often times this is done at the expense of getting core service/product delivery done correctly and to client specifications. Providing product/service on time - to specifications - will win the hearts and minds of your customers every time, over giving them more than they want (or need) half the time.
How Retailers Can Make the Most of Customer Satisfaction Data
As recent retail news clearly indicates, the economic downturn is rapidly and drastically changing consumers' perceived needs and spending behaviors. Customers are seeking more value for their hard-earned money and pursuing creative ways to stretch their dwindling budgets. In turn, under the pressure of unprecedented revenue losses, many retailers are nervously attempting to cut operating costs and remain competitive by slashing prices, reducing staff levels, and trimming inventories.
Credit Unions: Making the Most of Membership Growth
These are anxious times for both providers and consumers in the financial services industry, especially banking. Market valuations of the major national banks are plummeting and the FDIC is taking smaller regional and local banks into receivership at the rate of two or three per week. But even amidst the turmoil, Credit Unions have found themselves in a rather more positive position.
Top 10 Customer Satisfaction Survey Best Practices
You probably already have a very good idea of what drives customer satisfaction. Customer service professionals can generally create surveys that, on the surface, might closely resemble those created by survey methodologists. However, the words generally, might, and closely are crucial. Familiarity with the day-to-day needs of customers can well inform the content of a survey, but even the best intentions can have unintended consequences on question design.
Best Buy Case Study: Building Multi-Channel Retail Satisfaction
Many retailers measure customer satisfaction based solely on the point of sale, but satisfaction and loyalty are often strongly cemented - and potentially damaged - by other stages of the customer experience. A multi-channel retailer that truly understands the value of customer relationships treats the total customer experience as a portfolio of touch points. By measuring satisfaction across the entire customer life cycle, Best Buy discovers the impact of each touch point and how best to capitalize on opportunities to strengthen customer relationships for long-term profitability.
2008 Telecom-Cable Industry Satisfaction Report
Telecommunication and cable companies have operated as virtual monopolies for decades, each with their own domain. Telecom companies provided phone service; cable companies provided video. But as technology rapidly evolves and converges, telecom and cable companies increasingly find themselves encroaching on each other's turf. Innovations in communications technology - like Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) - are leading these industries into a head-to-head battle for the same customer.
2008 Contact Center Satisfaction Index
As consumer spending weakens and the economy takes a downturn, organizations must focus more on customer retention and less on costly customer acquisition. Because they are at the frontlines of the customer-supplier relationship, contact centers assume a large portion of the burden in making sure a company can keep its customers.
Addressing Cross-Cultural Comparability in Survey Data
Companies with an international footprint often wish to compare the satisfaction of customers in one country vs. those in another country. This is typically not a wise allocation of scarce research resources. Firms tend to be much better off by focusing on the optimization of customer attitudes and behaviors within each country rather than the comparison of customer sentiment across countries.
Six Costly Customer Satisfaction Myths and Misunderstandings
Executives at most companies believe they understand the meaning and importance of customer satisfaction: "Satisfied" customers are not only more likely to spend more money on their products and services - and probably more frequently - but they're also more likely to recommend their company to others, producing even greater profits. But it's not quite that simple.
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Call Center
Optimizing Customer Satisfaction and Maximizing Financial Performance
Many organizations, especially those with successful customer satisfaction measurement programs, ultimately ask "When is enough really enough?" Their measurement-inspired action plans and ongoing investments yield an assessment of customer touch points that indicates continued improvement. But, overall customer satisfaction and desired financial outcomes remain elusive.
Customer-Focused Strategies in the Multi-Channel Marketplace
As firms increasingly invest in systems and technologies that create greater flexibility in building customer relations, managers need better tools to measure and manage those relationships. Absent a more precise understanding of the value of the customer asset in this environment, managers will be left to try to manage these new customer-driven relationships with piecemeal “business as usual” and silo-based approaches.
Customer Asset Management: A New Paradigm for the Modern Business Firm
Because of the massive shift in economic activity from manufacturing and mass production toward service and information exchange, the modern economy is quite different from the one about which most economic theory and measurement were developed. Economic growth, for firms and for nations, is no longer simply a matter of producing more with fewer resources (i.e. productivity), but rather a matter of better matching supply to a progressively heterogeneous demand...
The American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) Technology: A Methodological Primer
The American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) has a proven relationship with customer spending, shareholder value, cash flows, business performance and GDP growth. The technology upon which it is based is backed by over 70 years of rigorous scientific inquiry in the fields of consumer psychology and psychometrics, coupled with advanced analytic techniques from statistics, econometrics, and chemometrics.
In the private sector the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) has a proven relationship with customer spending, shareholder value, cash flows, business performance and GDP growth. The technology upon which it is based is backed by over 70 years of rigorous scientific inquiry in the fields of consumer psychology and psychometrics, coupled with advanced analytic techniques from statistics, econometrics, and chemometrics...
2003 Consumer Satisfaction with the Mortgage Lending Process
The mortgage banking industry presently faces many challenges and opportunities as the realities that have defined the housing market in the past few years begin to change. Interest rates are beginning to rise from their historic low levels, precipitating a shift in the share of origination volumes away from refinancings toward purchases of new and existing homes.
How Customer Satisfaction Impacts Telecom and Cable's Battle for the Consumer
To provide insight into howcustomer satisfaction impacts competition between telecomand cable companies, CFI Group conducted a survey of over 1,200 households to contrast customer satisfaction between the two industries and gauge how it will determine the winners and losers in the battle for the consumer.
View the results of our 4th Annual Contact Center Satisfaction Index (CCSI) as we examine the success and shortcomings of contact centers to reveal what actually affects customer satisfaction, loyalty, and behavior.
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