Providing excellent customer support is a great way to maintain a healthy customer retention rate and reduce churn. Customer support agents must always remain aware of industry trends and adjust their strategies to meet the demand.
As a customer support executive, knowing the vital customer support statistics trending this year will help you shape your team to handle next year’s expectations. For example, did you know that over 50% of customers will jump to your next competitor after one unsatisfactory experience?
This information will help you plan and structure your customer support team to keep you ahead of the competition and satisfy your customers so they don’t jump ship.
In this post, we will shed more light on why customer support stats matter and share must-see customer support stats to help you offer the best services to your customers and grow your business.
Why Customer Support Stats Matter
Customer support statistics provide an idea of what to prioritize in customer service. These numbers shed light on customer expectations and what they want to see businesses do. It is a reference point for your customer support strategies to help you stay on track.
Businesses invest a lot of money in customer support, from implementing costly strategies to investing in expensive customer support software like Zendesk, HubSpot, and other intercom alternatives. It only makes sense that these investments yield healthy returns through improved customer retention, acquisition, and a steady annual recurring revenue (ARR). Also, for companies in competitive industries like SaaS, tech, health and wellness, etc., having solid customer service may be what helps you stand out.
Customers will always drift to companies that cater to their needs on time. If you are not investing in every aspect of customer service, staying abreast of customer support statistics, and leveraging technological advancements in the field, you may be left behind. Tracking customer service stats provides deeper insight into dynamic customer motivations and their needs, so you can leverage this information to implement powerful strategies.
Here are 5 insightful customer support statistics to keep in mind this year.
5 Customer Support Stats
The best customer service can convince any customer, even the deeply unhappy ones. You need a supportive, empathetic, and seamless customer service strategy to keep a customer loyal.
These statistics show how investing in customer support will help you drive consistent business growth.
Customer expectations are increasing.
Customer loyalty is quite fickle. You are in a world where a customer can easily jump ship to your competitor for very few reasons, so you must always meet and exceed their expectations. Here are some insights into customer expectations:
- 86% of loyal customers will switch to a competitor after two or three bad customer support experiences.
- 49% of customers who used a brand for 12 months will leave if the customer service declines.
- Slow response time is one of the major contributors to a bad customer support experience. 72% of customers want fast service and to be catered to immediately.
- 52% of customers who make requests via a digital channel want to be responded to within the first hour.
- 60% of customers pick one brand over another because they expect better customer service from the former brand.
- 70% of customers want the support agent they speak with to have the full context of their issues without having to transfer them to someone else.
- 48% of buyers expect special treatment if they’ve been a loyal or good customer.
- 49% of customers in the U.S. rate social media customer service as very important.
Consistently meeting customer expectations as they evolve will build brand loyalty, reduce churn, and maintain healthy business growth.
Customer service impacts purchase decisions.
Customer service is not just focused on solving problems. It is also about creating repeat sales and building customer loyalty. Don’t believe us? Well, 81% of customers say they will repurchase from a company if they had a great customer support experience the first time. Great customer support is powerful enough to convince one-time customers to keep purchasing from your brand or switch to a competitor completely.
The majority of customers believe that customer service is one of the major forces behind their purchase decisions. They will only buy from a brand with reputable, positive customer service and won’t hesitate to switch to a competitor after multiple bad support experiences.
Personalization drives customer loyalty.
Customers want to feel like you know their pain points and understand how to help them. They don’t want to be treated like just another number but as an important part of your brand story. This is why personalization and adding the human touch to customer service is important. The need for personalization also reflects how customers want their issues handled. According to this study conducted last year, 36% of customers would rather wait to speak with a human agent instead of using the multiple automated customer service resources available.
59% of customers also believe that support agents should leverage the data they have on them to create more personalized experiences. Wondering how brands can get the customer data needed to create personalized support experiences? 86% of customers stated that they are willing to share their data with companies if it would make them better informed about their preferences during support calls. While technological advancements are great for customer service, nothing compares to having the human touch and personalizing support calls to match the customer’s needs.
Customers share support experiences.
Customers share great and bad support experiences with their friends and family. You have to work super hard to avoid the possibility of even one bad support experience for a customer to protect your brand, especially in this age of social media. Word-of-mouth marketing, as powerful and positive as can be, is a double-edged sword and can do real damage to your brand when negative.
This 2019 Salesforce study showed that 62% of customers share bad customer service experiences with friends. In the same study, 72% of customers said they also share great customer support experiences with their friends. So, if you improve your customer support strategies, you will get free word-of-mouth marketing from even the most distressed customers.
AI is here but not fully utilized.
AI in customer care is very exciting. Brands are already leveraging chatbots in customer support to automate as many interactions as possible. However, there is still a ways to go regarding artificial intelligence in customer support. Here are some insights:
- 80% of customer support executives said customer satisfaction and overall support performance have improved since implementing conversational AI.
- 90% of respondents noticed an increase in the speed of customer complaint resolution and more volume of call processing since using AI.
- 57% of industry leaders feel like AI chatbots produce huge ROI on very minimal investment.
- 72% of business leaders agree that using AI in any form of customer support within the next 12 months is important.
AI helps businesses deliver faster customer service. This technology works great as a first point of contact with a customer after a ticket is filed to handle the conversation before a human agent takes over.
Final Thoughts
Substantial evidence shows that customer experience is a major priority for businesses in any niche. With the statistics and insight shared in this post, you now understand why it’s necessary to implement the best customer service experience for your customers. Customers place a huge emphasis on business customer service. How you choose to navigate your support strategies will set the course for your reputation among customers now and in the near future.
