First of its kind, CCMC’s 2021 Customer Delight Study is an independent scientific large-scale study of the market impact of employing fifteen unique strategies to delight customers. 

Contradicting a recent Harvard Business Review article entitled, Don’t Delight Your Customers, study findings show that delighting customers may indeed be your most powerful marketing tool, leading to:

• Customer retention,
• Growth,
• Word-of-mouth, and
• Increased profits

Study Methodology

Sponsored by VIPdesk, in April 2021, CCMC undertook a web-based panel survey of more than 2,500 individuals with annual household incomes over $100,000.  The study focused on products or services purchased in the prior twelve months.

66% percent of the respondents reported being delighted with a customer experience in the past 12 months.  Delighted respondents were asked follow-up questions about the type of delighter experienced, its impact, the business’s method of communication, and the customer’s willingness to pay more for the product or service in the future.

Those who did not report a delightful experience were queried about their most positive customer experience in the prior twelve months.  This baseline of satisfied customers was compared to those delighted to quantify the lift from delight.

Who Benefits from the Customer Delight Study Findings?

The findings are relevant to businesses selling to high-end customers.  Executives and employees in the following groups will especially want to understand the study results:

• C-Suite executives, especially marketing and sales, for the big, enhanced word-of- mouth and cross-selling benefits of creating customer delight;  
• Technology executives, for learning how tech, done right, can delight as often as people; and
• Quality, Continuous Improvement and Service Staff for affirmation of the time it takes to educate, empathize and connect with customers.

2021 National Customer Delight Study Infographic

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