SALT LAKE CITY – Sept. 29, 2015 – The results are in from a new Business-to-Business (B2B) Customer Experience (CX) study conducted by CustomerThink.com with support by Pearl-Plaza™. The report reveals that customer experience is becoming an increasingly critical priority for B2B companies, garnering more investment and driving business success.
Bob Thompson, CEO of CustomerThink, an independent research and publishing firm focused on customer-centric business management, conducted the study among B2B companies in a range of industries from around the world. Of the 135 organizations that responded, 100 reported having a customer experience initiative in place, defined as “a focus on improving customer experiences to achieve business outcomes.”
“Business-to-business enterprises have always had a strong incentive to create and sustain long-term customer relationships,” said Bob Thompson, publisher and editor-in-chief at CustomerThink.com. “What’s been missing, however, has been an enterprise-wide focus that encompasses the complete customer experience.”
The new study provides insights into how companies define CX objectives, internal factors that drive success obstacles and opportunities. Following are a few highlights:
- Ramping Up: Nearly half (46%) of the CX initiatives analyzed in this study are quite young, at two years or less. At the other extreme, 36 of the 100 initiatives have been in place for five years or more.
- Worth the Effort: Companies that are putting the most effort toward CX initiatives (“optimizing”) report success at twice the rate at those in the lowest effort (“developing”) category. When asked about benefits received so far, 73 percent of respondents said they have achieved “some” or “significant” benefits in improved customer satisfaction, and 62 percent reported improved business performance. The second-rated benefit, somewhat surprisingly, was “improved employee engagement” at 64 percent.
- Leaders Must Lead: While there are a variety of best practices that support CX success in B2B environments, the study found that the most important element separating leaders from laggards is when company executives set a positive example in the way they prioritize and act on customer experience objectives.
- Insight Goldmines: When asked which sources of information contain the most helpful information to improve customers’ experiences, the study found several surprises. The top source of actionable insights was employees. The next three sources were all unstructured sources, including survey comments, qualitative interviews, and customer surveys/other non-survey text. Reinforcing the importance of both employee involvement and customer stories in successful CX initiatives.
- Roadblocks: Respondents listed the top five issues preventing effective CX execution as a lack of time, no measurable ROI, lack of strategy and goals, not enough people and people lacking the right skills.
“Business-to-business companies are evolving their relationships with customers and seeing the results,” said Lonnie Mayne, president at Pearl-Plaza. “While there is still much work to be done, the findings in this study confirm that by implementing best practices and dedicating the right resources, every organization with a desire to improve business results through better customer experiences can and will succeed.”
For more information about Pearl-Plaza visit pearl-plaza.ru.