Greg Stuart, former CEO of the Interactive Advertising Bureau, stated, Marketers generally distrust research and data. The same can be said for retail managers and owners. Data is gathered and then sometimes skewed to suit the manager’s notion of what is really going on in the store. One of the reasons for distrust stems from the belief that consumers often do not tell the truth, or at least contradict themselves, in surveys.

The Advertising Research Federation, offers this explanation. There is a general belief that over 50 percent of the research done at companies is wasted. Often all we do is present numbers. We don’t present insights. Customer surveys measure what customers really think and feel about a company. Customer feedback determines if customer needs are being met. All-inclusive customer service assessments that include mystery shopping and customer surveys should offer data that largely reflects and supports the findings of the other. If a manager consistently dispute or ignores the findings, reevaluate your specific program, examining the data to ensure the criterion for measurement is appropriately capturing the results you desire, then use the truths of that data to meet customer expectations.

In a first of its kind retail benchmark study, ICC/Decision Services visited over 50 retailers across the categories of apparel, department store, electronics, home improvement, toy, specialty and sporting goods to measure their readiness for the holiday season. From October 26 through November 18, 2010, ICC/Decision Services conducted 1621 nationwide store visits to assess sales helpfulness and employee service. The National Retail Federation (NRF) forecasts a 2010 holiday sales increase of 2.3 percent. But, argues David Rich, President & CEO of ICC/Decision Services, “retailers are still leaving millions on the table.”

In areas such as greeting and thanking customers, and cleanliness, for instance, the majority of retailers scored well, which indicates store associates are focusing on the customer experience. However, in other key areas such as explaining promotions, suggesting additional items, and determining customer needs, many retailers are underperforming. For instance, suggestive selling occurred only 43.7% of the time on average across all 1621 store visits. “Associates may be handling customers graciously,” says Rich, “but they are not converting that relationship into sales.”

The top performing retailer was Yankee Candle, which earned an overall score of 92.8 out of 100, achieving a selling score of 87.8 and a service score of 97.8. Lowest performing segments of the marketplace included sporting goods, department stores and toy departments. Retailers visited included: Aeropostale (ARO), Ann Taylor (ANN), Best Buy (BBY), Build-A-Bear (BBW), Dick’s Sporting Goods (DKS), Game Stop (GME), Gap (GPS), J. Crew (JCG), Kohl’s (KSS), Macy’s (M), Nordstrom (JWN), Office Depot (ODP), Sears (SHLD), TJ Maxx (TJX), Target (TGT), Toys “R” Us (TOY), and more.

For a summary of the “Retailer Behavioral Outlook for 2010 Holiday Season” or go to this link: http://www.iccds.com/benchmarks

About ICC/Decision Services:

ICC/Decision Services was founded in 1979 to design and execute Customer Experience Management programs. ICC/Decision Services offers a wide range of qualitative and quantitative business tools, including mystery shopping, store audits, customer feedback and employee satisfaction surveys. Clients include Coach, 7-11, L.L. Bean, CVS, Foot Locker, Walmart and others. The company is headquartered at 561 7th Avenue New York, NY 10018, U.S.A. Phone: (800) 444-1717. E-mail: info@iccds.com.

“They definitely aren’t shy about telling us what they like and don’t like,” says Lindsay Anvik, director of marketing at PlumWillow, who helps oversee the internship program at its offices in Manhattan.

Flexible, web-based companies aren’t just creating products and services based on customer preferences – they’re making their target market part of the design and marketing process reports Susan Etlinger, a consultant at the Altimeter Group, which researches Web technologies and advises companies on how to use them.

Moving beyond “the old-fashioned focus group and into co-creation with your demographic is something that will happen more in the next couple of years,” Ms. Etlinger says. “All business will have to learn how to cope with a new generation of users that are used to their particular experience of the Web.”

According to NRF chief economist Jack Kleinhenz, retailers are expected to compensate for this fundamental shift in shopper mentality by offering significant promotions throughout the holiday season and emphasizing value throughout their marketing efforts,”

Colin Sebastian of Lazard Capital Markets is predicting e-tail growth of 10-15 percent this holiday season but also warned that customer acquisition costs could go up as well since more and more shoppers tend to begin their online shopping on search engines and marketplaces.

Retailers can position themselves to benefit from shoppers caution by responding to the interest in low prices. Consumers also noted that they favor the retailers that offer a broad selection of product choices.

According to a recent study done by the Pew Research Center, consumer needs aren’t the same as they once were. According to the study, just 42 percent of Americans say they consider a television set a necessity, down from 52 percent just last year and 64 percent in 2006. The landline telephone also saw a dip in numbers. Of those polled, 62 percent still consider the landline phone a necessity, down from 68 percent in 2009.

“It’s true that in the digital era, consumers know they can watch a lot of television programming on their computers or smartphones,” Pew said. They also can make calls from their cell phones, a belief young people especially share. Fewer than half of those in the 18-29 age range consider a landline phone a necessity, but almost 60 percent think a cell phone is a must have item.

The report also shows people consider cars, clothes dryers, microwaves, home air conditioners and home PCs as less of a necessity than years prior.

“This suggests that the psyche of the American consumer is in a much different place now than it had been in the heady days before the recession.”

Still, just because more people categorize certain goods as a luxury over a necessity doesn’t mean the products aren’t selling. Retailers can take this information and apply what they know to their future marketing strategies.

Corporate leaders dramatically overestimate how much the customer wants to talk to a customer service representative. They believe customers value live service twice as much as self-service. HBR’s data shows customers are significantly indifferent to that claim, and they value self-service just as much as they value using the phone. More interestingly, that indifference doesn’t change across their demographic, issue type or urgency.

It’s an interesting predicament: what should your company do to improve its customer service when the customer prefers self-service? And what’s compelling the customer to repel real-life interaction? It could be argued that with the rise in social networks, people don’t like to engage in as many face-to-face conversations with others. Maybe fascination with technology has won out and the lure of fancy, powerful machines are more attractive than the sales associates. Or, now, everyone considers themselves a control freak and dislikes relying on other people to get something done.

Or maybe, customers haven’t wanted the relationships companies have been pushing all along and this rise in self-service finally gives them the easy way out. That’s not a comforting thought for retailers who build their company on the promises of quality customer service. So, what should those retailers do?

It’s a simple task in the world of automated customer service recordings, information computer stations and high tech self-service cash registers: have customer service reps be real people. Too often, customers blow off the sales associates because they sound like robots reading from a script. If customer service practices create authentic experiences by individualizing how each customer gets served, it’s a good bet that customers will again appreciate that friendly face that greets them right when they walk through the door.

A story in the New York Times today by Alex Mindlin discusses a study in the Journal of Consumer Research which tracks 172 angry consumers who made their complaints known on ConsumerAffairs.com and the Ripoff Report.

Does time heal all wounds? Yes and no. The report says that over time the desire for revenge on the part of loyal consumers does decrease. But that revenge factor is replaced by the desire to not do business with the offending party. If the customer considers the brand relationship to be more casual, they are less inclined.

The research also tracked a scenario where people where told to imagine being mistreated in there favorite restaurant. Loyal customers were 25 percent less likely to crave revenge if offered a $50 gift certificate. The casual customers, perhaps sensing a battle for their loyalty, required $100.

Bad news has always traveled fast, and it’s faster than ever now. This case study makes a clear and concise point about the customer experience. Service outages have to be dealt with quickly and substantially. The problem will not go away, the customer probably will, and they will take their friends and whoever else will listen along with them.

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Dr. Curtis wanted to know find out how she could sell hand-washing the same way multinational corporations sell Speed stick deodorant and Pringles potato chips. Many companies had perfected the art of creating automatic behaviors and habits among consumers which have helped earn billions of dollars. Could the same habit trigger approach help save lives in third world countries?

Studies revealed that Ghanaians used soap when they felt their hands were dirty such as after cooking with grease or after traveling into the city. These hand-washing habits were prompted by feelings of disgust. Dr. Curtis and her colleagues realized that they had to craft a habit where people felt a sense of disgust cued by the toilet. The queasiness then can trigger the need for soap.

Ads started running showing mothers and children walking out of bathrooms with a glowing purple pigment on their hands that contaminated everything they touched. The ads worked. There was a 13% increase in the use of soap after the toilet.

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Text messaging is a simple concept. Retailers place an ad either in a newspaper, magazine, TV, or radio. The ad highlights the special promotion and a shopper participates by sending a text message with a specific word or abbreviation to the short code in the ad.

Online testing and research firm Keynote Systems found that the average for a text response from a short code was approximately 9 seconds. The fastest response was less than 6 seconds. This study was based on SMS messages sent to 24 popular short codes.

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