In early 2013, Deloitte and Bazaarvoice partnered to investigate what online consumer feedback reviews could reveal on the relationships between NPS, price, product assortment and customer service. In a short 5 week project 7.8 million customer reviews across 230 different businesses were interrogated. A selection of the key findings were included in this short presentation given at the Deloitte Consumer Business Predictions event @Rotterdam May 2013.
8. Topics to watch out for
• CB Predictions 28th May:
Insights study with Bazaarvoice
• Digital transformation of customer
services whitepaper
Coming up later this year:
• Bazaarvoice conversation index vol.
• CB @KLM Open 12th September:
eCommerce / Omnichannel with guest speaker
Jacqueline Smith-Dubendorfer
Director Platforms and Consumer Experience
Global eCommerce - Adidas Group
• Shopping 2020 – Orientation whitepaper
Strategy
Web
Mobile
Social
Insights
Security
23. Topics to watch out for
• CB Predictions 28th May:
Insights study with Bazaarvoice
• Digital transformation of customer
services whitepaper
Coming up later this year:
• Bazaarvoice conversation index vol.
• CB @KLM Open 12th September:
eCommerce / Omnichannel with guest speaker
Jacqueline Smith-Dubendorfer
Director Platforms and Consumer Experience
Global eCommerce - Adidas Group
• Shopping 2020 – Orientation whitepaper
Strategy
Web
Mobile
Social
Insights
Security
Engaging today’s consumer is a digital battlefield. Technology innovations have been rapidly adopted by consumers resulting in new discovery and buying behaviours and expectations.Consumers are constantly connected to the internet through smart, portable, and highly usable devices, enabling… - A form of social connectivity in which customers are influenced by and influencers of their peers. (Personal story about sister in-law) - A form of commercial availability in which consumers can access a wealth of information about products, shop at any time of day, browse from shop to shop in a few key taps without having to leave the comfort of their seats.Technology, connectivity and availability is empowering the consumer and their expectations towards the businesses they buy from is continually rising.On the surface, this might appear to be a concerning development for retailers and consumer business organisations. The status quo cannot be maintained. However, there is a bright opportunity to this trend. As consumers use smartphones, tablets, PCs and all other kinds of browsers to connect, research and buy, they leave behind breadcrumbs of information. Information that can be utilised by organisations to yield yet greater levels of consumer insight and understanding. Which can then be turned into better offers, improved products and enhanced services. Things that we all want as consumers.The bright side of this trend is that the best organisations can tap into yet greater levels of customer insight. They have yet more opportunities to engage and delight customers. More opportunities to differentiate from the herd. And through the increased levels of business transparency that digital provides, above average businesses will differentiate and thrive more quickly.. While below average businesses will be picked out and their market share eroded.
Research goalsAssert that digital technologies allow organisations to be more customer centricShow how goal 1 can be proved using just one platform for online reviews – BazaarVoiceEstablish credibility of fact-based researchResearch methodDescribe the customer journey and the impact on the company key functionsDetermine and set hypotheses to test how product reviews can help to improve the company key functionsApply a statistical research method to test the hypothesesTest the hypotheses and draw conclusions based on the findingsResultsDescribe a future where other sources of data via digital channels could be used. Potentially re-use other findings from other data sources (maybe we merge this with the above)Provide advice on the high-level steps for an organisation can become more customer centric using our target operating model playbook
All retailers have a positive NPS, the bulk is higher than 50% which is considered very good on a scale of -100% to 100%The bulk of product ratings varies between 3,5 and 4,5 on a scale of 0-5 Retailer’s average rating of the products they are selling and their average NPS are significantly correlated:Retailers with a high average product rating have a high average NPSCustomers that are satisfied with the retailer’s products are also more likely to be loyal to that retailerAverage product rating and customer loyalty is the lowest for retailers in the Consumer Electronics industryAverage product rating and customer loyalty has the highest spread for retailers in the Home Improvement industry Average customer loyalty is the highest for retailers in the Drugstores industry
All retailers have a positive NPS, the bulk is higher than 50% which is considered very good on a scale of -100% to 100%The bulk of product ratings varies between 3,5 and 4,5 on a scale of 0-5 Retailer’s average rating of the products they are selling and their average NPS are significantly correlated:Retailers with a high average product rating have a high average NPSCustomers that are satisfied with the retailer’s products are also more likely to be loyal to that retailerAverage product rating and customer loyalty is the lowest for retailers in the Consumer Electronics industryAverage product rating and customer loyalty has the highest spread for retailers in the Home Improvement industry Average customer loyalty is the highest for retailers in the Drugstores industry
Most consumer electronics companies have a relatively low NPS (i.e. avg. NPS < 50), however, all but one have 20% or less products with a poor rating (have a lower NPS rating than their product assortment would suggest)Home improvement industry has largest difference in the quality of product assortments; in addition, 3 out 11 home improvement companies drag the industry average for NPS vs. poor product assortment downAbout 75% of the apparel, drug and mass merchant & general retail companies have an average or higher NPS than their product assortment would suggest; possibly due to the association between companies and their products (e.g. size/diversity of product assortment, strength individual product brands)More than 40% of the companies in 4 out of 6 industries studied, have a poor product assortment; thus at a significant number of companies there is room for improvementCompanies that sell sports products seem to do significant better at selecting the right assortment; less than 10% of those companies have a poor product assortmentRemarkable is that mass merchants & general retail do not have the poorest product assortment; they have the most varied assortments (i.e. more vulnerable for selecting the wrong products)
Mention difference between cheap and expensive: cheap is value for money, expensive is no value for moneyPrice perception is an important buying criteria, however it does not impact the post purchase product satisfactionFor identifying products as either “Cheap” or “Expensive” a 80:20 rule was used. Products were identified as “Cheap” when “Cheap” related pivot words were mentioned 4x as much in the reviews as pivot words related to “Expensive”. Products were identified as “Expensive” when the opposite was the caseSignificantly more products are identified as cheap rather than expensive which could be explained by the fact that the people who reviewed the products also bought them, therefore they have already decided to buy them and haven’t identified them as ‘too’ expensive“Cheap”The highest % of mentions as cheap have very high average ratings; these could be potential products whose prices could potentially be raisedProducts identified as cheap get on average a rating >4, this could suggest that the price also influences the price perception (good value for money)“Expensive”There are no clear groupingsHighlights the low amount of products being identified as being expensiveThe products identified as expensive are also more spread out than those who are not, suggesting that there is less of a trend and that product price perception and rating are more product relatedRemarksReviews for one product (Quantum Finish) were removed from the dataset. It did not fall in the 80:20 area and was identified as an outlierWith >=100 reviews
Price perception is an important buying criteria, however it does not impact the post purchase product satisfactionFor identifying products as either “Cheap” or “Expensive” a 80:20 rule was used. Products were identified as “Cheap” when “Cheap” related pivot words were mentioned 4x as much in the reviews as pivot words related to “Expensive”. Products were identified as “Expensive” when the opposite was the caseSignificantly more products are identified as cheap rather than expensive which could be explained by the fact that the people who reviewed the products also bought them, therefore they have already decided to buy them and haven’t identified them as ‘too’ expensive“Cheap”The highest % of mentions as cheap have very high average ratings; these could be potential products whose prices could potentially be raisedProducts identified as cheap get on average a rating >4, this could suggest that the price also influences the price perception (good value for money)“Expensive”There are no clear groupingsHighlights the low amount of products being identified as being expensiveThe products identified as expensive are also more spread out than those who are not, suggesting that there is less of a trend and that product price perception and rating are more product relatedRemarksReviews for one product (Quantum Finish) were removed from the dataset. It did not fall in the 80:20 area and was identified as an outlierWith >=100 reviews
NPS is a measure of customer loyalty and advocacyFor high scoring NPS businesses complaints regarding customer service are less than 1% of total issues raised by the customerThe best performing businesses have do not suffer from an increase in customer service issues during the Christmas period
Customer ServiceA high % of customer service complaint correlates with low NPS. As the % of customer service complaints is reduced the NPS increasesProduct FlawsBusinesses with the highest NPS manage this in spite of greater % of product flaws than those with low NPSShipping IssuesAs NPS increases, the shipping issues becomes the largest percentage of non-product issuesShipping issues decline as a proportion of total issues with increasing NPS. However, they increase as a proportion of the non-product related issuesAt good levels of NPS around 50), shipping is the largest percentage of non-product issues. In pursuit of excellence, businesses dramatically cut shipping issues by 50%
More reviews are from women rather than men in 7 out of 9 identified industries. Women represent 65% of the total of reviewsDrugstores received the highest amount of reviews by women with 92% of all reviews. Sports Products has marginally more reviews by women with 53%Consumer Electronics and Transportation are the only industries in which more reviews are received from men rather than women with respective 53% and 84% The most reviews with a product suggestion are found in Mass Merchants, Apparel and Home Improvement industryDespite the lower percentage of reviews, men provide more product suggestions in the Mass merchants & General Retail and Home Improvement industryIn line with the higher percentage of reviews, women provide more product suggestions in the Apparel, Sports Products and Travel industry
People that are >35 provide more reviews in 7 out of 9 identified industries compared to younger people. They represent 60% of all reviewsHome Improvement and Travel have the largest group of reviewers, 40% and 36% with age above 55Books, etc. and Consumer Electronics have the youngest group of reviewers, 91% and 36% of these groups are <25Product SuggestionThe most reviews with a product suggestion are found in Mass Merchants, Apparel and Home Improvement industryPeople that are >35 provide more reviews with a product suggestion in 6 out of 7 identified industries compared to younger people. There is no significant difference in age distribution between the graphsConsumer Electronics and Sports Products have the youngest group of reviewers, 43% and 22% of these groups are <25