Marketing Forecast from Ad-ology

The August edition of Ad-ology Marketing Forecast includes Bad Customer Service, Young Adults & Cause Marketing, and Online Shopping+Social Networks.

Just how frustrated are Americans with the state of customer service? According to a new Consumer Reports’ survey, 65% are “tremendously annoyed” by rude salespeople and 64% of respondents said that they had left a store in the previous 12 months because of poor service. Consumer Reports also found that 71% of survey respondents were extremely irritated when they couldn’t reach a human on the phone. Sixty-seven percent said they hung up the phone without getting their issue resolved.

According to a new survey, consumers are willing to pay for good customer service. A new survey, The Value of Great Customer Service, commissioned by StellaService suggests that customers are willing to pay a premium of approximately 10.7% for excellent online customer service, or as much as $17.3 billion in 2010. Furthermore, consumers in the online retail category are willing to pay an even higher premium for great service (10.7%) than they would in most other categories. Due to the seemingly distant and remote nature of online shopping, it makes sense that consumers would pay a higher premium to have the comfort and peace of mind that they will be taken care of in the case of a serious question, concern or problem.

As retailers continue to adjust their online presence to improve consumer experiences, the complexity of the underlying source code has increased. Few Web sites operate error free, especially in the multitude of browser options available to consumers. Unfortunately, about 8 out of 10 consumers encounter at least one problem during their online transactions and many consumers have something to say about these negative experiences.

Part of excellent customer service is keeping on top of your what’s going on with your clients and their business. But, sometimes conversations can stall or you just can’t seem to get enough information out of them.

LOL. BRB. ROTFL. Among many others, these acronyms have crept into our daily lexicon. I recently came across a blog post by Dave Brock, a sales consultant, who introduced me to a very important acronym in the sales industry: WIIFM.