Customer experience metrics still poor

Although large companies are increasingly using customer experience (CX) metrics to help manage and improve their customer experience management programmes, the overall effectiveness of these measurement strategies is worryingly low, according to an annual study by Temkin Group.

The latest report, entitled 'The State of CX Metrics 2012', revealed that companies with stronger CX metrics programmes are more likely to be customer experience leaders and to outperform the business results of their competitors.

But while these efforts are seen as important, only 11% of respondents received "good" ratings for their CX metrics programme. Overall, most companies have not shown any improvement in these ratings since the same study was conducted in 2011.

Among the other key findings of the 2012 survey:

• Companies with stronger CX metrics programmes are almost four times as likely to deliver customer experience that is considerably above average in their industry.
   
• Companies are increasing their use of metrics focused on likelihood to recommend (including Net Promoter Score) and ease of doing business.
   
• Only 11% of respondents think that their company mostly integrates CX and financial metrics, and it's down from 13% in 2011.
   
• Only 35% of companies consider CX metrics in many of their important decisions.
   
• About 40% of executive teams review CX metrics at least monthly (roughly the same as in 2011).
   
• Half of companies (50%) use common metrics across most of their company, an increase from 43% in 2011.
   
• Over half of companies feel good about their measurements of phone and online experiences, but only about one-quarter of them feel that way about measuring mobile and cross channel experiences.

The company's annual assessment of CX metrics examines four areas:

1. Consistent: Does the company use common CX metrics across the organisation?
    
2. Impactful: Do important decisions consider the CX metrics?
    
3. Integrated: Are trade-offs made between CX and financial metrics?
    
4. Continuous: Do leaders regularly examine the CX metrics?

"Companies focus on what they measure, so it's important that their CX metrics point them in the right direction. Unfortunately, very few companies are doing a good job with their CX metrics," concluded Bruce Temkin, managing partner for Temkin Group.