CCMC conducted the independent 2020 National Customer Rage Study of corporate complaint handling in America in collaboration with the Center for Services Leadership at the WP Carey School of Business at Arizona State University.
CCMC is in the unique marketplace position of having played a key role from the start in examining customer care in the United States, allowing it to offer a clear comparison of customer satisfaction with corporate customer care efforts across more than the last four decades.
HOW WAS THE 2020 NATIONAL CUSTOMER RAGE STUDY CONDUCTED?
For consistency, the 2020 National Customer Rage Study, completed in February 2020, repeated core questions from the original 1976 White House study and previous eight Rage Studies (2003-2017), with a focus on the most serious problems with products/services experienced in the past 12 months.
The 2020 Customer Rage Study Survey, conducted by Internet, interviewed a representative household panel of 1,026 respondents. The overall margin of error of results is similar to prior waves: in this case, ±1.8%-3.0% (at 95% confidence).
The study has also evolved to keep pace with the changing customer care and communications’ landscape. For example, special questions were added to address social media as a complaint-handling channel.
WHAT ARE SOME OF THE KEY TAKE-AWAYS & CORE FINDINGS FROM THE 2020 STUDY?
- Corporate America is risking a shocking $494 billion in revenue by doing customer care the wrong way
- Customer rage is fueled by customers wasting considerable time complaining and getting little in return
- Fully 66% of households experienced a product or service problem in the past 12 months
- More than one-half of complainants indicated that they get NOTHING when they complain
- Nearly 2/3 of those with a problem experienced customer rage
- Satisfactory complaint handling remains associated with high levels of brand loyalty, and mediocre complaint handling costs businesses dearly
- Customers go elsewhere, and only one in eight less than satisfied customers will recommend the offending company
- Rage is shared like never before with friends and neighbors. 17% seek to raise public awareness of their experience, dissatisfied complainants tell twice as many people about their negative experience than satisfied customers do
- For better or worse, social media has become a pivotal portal for pre-purchase reasoning and post-purchase griping
- 55% expect a company response to a complaint posted on social media, and almost half do not get a response
- 14% post their complaint at least once on social media, and social media users post on product/service experiences an average of 16 times a year
- 48% use social media as a source of information during the year before buying products or services
- Complainant satisfaction improved significantly in 2020, yet billions of dollars and much social vitriol remain at risk
