• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_research, November 17, 2003

Voice Interaction on Phone and in Store Dominates Customer Preference

The first in the "State Of Customer Experience" series by Forrester research, asking how do firms manage their experiences with customers, concludes that there's no one individual responsible for overall customer experience, and phone interactions get top marks. In a survey of 110 US firms with annual revenues of more than $500 million, Forrester found that:

- Companies touch customers in many ways -- across diverse channels like the Web, call centers, and retail outlets; and throughout many stages from marketing to post-sales service.

-When we asked which group owns responsibility for online customer service, 29% of interviewees mentioned IT. The next-most-frequently named organization, eCommerce, runs the online service efforts for 23% of respondents.

All firms use the phone, and 67% of respondents feel that these conversations almost always meet their customers' needs. The second-highest-rated interaction channel, retail branches, got this top rating from 58% of the firms.

- Chat and instant messaging, the least-used channel on the list, received the most negative feedback -- 47% of its users say that this new channel only occasionally meets or almost never meets customer needs.

Do you have a single individual who is ultimately responsible for the whole customer experience -- from marketing to service?
	% of companies
Yes	22%
No	78%
What organization does the person belong to?
	% of companies
Marketing	29%
Customer service	25%
eBusiness	25%
Business executive	13%
Other	8%
Which customer interaction channels does your company use?
	% of companies
Phone	100%
Web	98%
Email	91%
IVR	56%
Mail/catalog	51%
Retail branches	50%
Chat/IM	33%

Find out more here.