Customer Satisfaction (CSAT):- Geo Differences

Hello,

I'm currently investigating how customer satisfaction ratings differ between the three main geos being NA, EMEA and APJ.

It seems that in general, regardless of the service delivery mechanisms used, EMEA Support organisations get lower CSAT rating than other geos.

Is that somehting you are also experiencing within your organisations? Has anyone got ideas why this is happening?

Thanks,

David

Permalink Reply by Haim Toeg on February 25, 2010 at 2:13pm: David,

This is an important question and has been covered in a variety of locations. Usually US ratings are the highest of all, EMEA would be significantly lower and the AP ratings would depend on the response distribution between the constituent countries (English speaking vs. North Asia / ASEAN / India).

The reasons for this are cultural more than anything else.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by John Ragsdale on February 25, 2010 at 2:22pm: Hi David;
I wrote about this in my blog last year (Understanding Cultural Differences in Customer Satisfaction Ratings) and have discussed it on a couple of webcasts. It is a touchy topic, and no matter what I say, I seem to offend people (as you will see in some blog comments).

Here is some data from our benchmark showing "after phone" customer satisfaction scores. These are top box scores, i.e., the percent of customer who say "Very Satisfied," typically translating to a 5 on a 1-5 scale, or 9-10 on a 1-10 scale. As you can see, in almost every criteria, North American customers rate higher than EMEA or APAC.

I have had calls with multiple members curious why seemingly identical service experiences are rated differently in different parts of the world. It is definitely a reality.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by David Perrault on February 26, 2010 at 8:37am: Thanks for the input Haim and John.

My view on this is that there is a cultural difference certainly between NA and EMEA.

I believe customers WW have the same expectations in terms of quality of service and EMEA customers are not more difficult to deal with than in any other geo.

However, there is a main difference around the 'service delivery' culture. Being French and Parisian, I have heard it many times! ;) E.g. there is no doubt in my mind that I will get a better service in a 4 stars hotel in California than in London or Paris.

Thoughts?; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Haim Toeg on February 26, 2010 at 10:10am: David,

I think focusing on the cultures of individual service providers is not going to help you much in understanding the differences in satisfaction survey results across cultures. From what I have seen, the results varied across two main variables:
1. The service level provided
2. The respondent's region

For the same service level, the responses would vary as indicated in John's response and the linked post. Bear in mind, though, my experience is exclusively in the enterprise software market, I do not know how blind the respondent would be to the different service cultures of the individual providers.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by David Perrault on February 26, 2010 at 11:22am: Take your point. Though we have seen that EMEA customers served by NA or APJ support centres are on average rating their experience higher than when the service is delivered by an EMEA support centre. In major IT companies, most processes, training and tools are aligned on a global basis.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by David Kay on March 25, 2010 at 7:35am: Don Frye of The MathWorks did a great presentation on this topic last November. His findings are generally consistent with those in this thread. Some great quotes from EMEA: "To reach of rating of 10, one must walk on water." And "Scoring ten in a category is for Americans. In Britain, nothing is ever good enough for a ten." "Even though I am also very satisfied this time, I will not give ten points." "For me, outstanding means outstanding and not simply good...try using a survey adapted for use in Sweden."

He made two other interesting observations:
- A ten point scale is way too granular for EMEA. Use Lickert, or something even simpler.
- Be aware that grades go the other direction in Germany. (1 is best, 6 is worst.) So be careful of numerical scales.

Good luck! John, will I start getting hate mail, too?

Best,
David; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by bill bleuel on March 25, 2010 at 12:07pm: I generally agree with the comments noted above. I have a data base spanning about 5 years with approximaely 1 million surveys for high technology companies in the hardware, software and medical electronics fields and includes both commercial and military products. My data covers field service, depot and help desk.

I have heard similar comments about EMEA customers. I recently compared the satisfaction levels for the English speaking countries (US, Canada, UK, Australia and New Zealand). Satisfaction in the UK was statistically lower than the others.

I sometimes post information on my blog www.thecustomerinstitute.blogspot.com; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Haim Toeg on March 25, 2010 at 2:36pm: bill bleuel said:
I generally agree with the comments noted above. I have a data base spanning about 5 years with approximaely 1 million surveys for high technology companies in the hardware, software and medical electronics fields and includes both commercial and military products. My data covers field service, depot and help desk.

I have heard similar comments about EMEA customers. I recently compared the satisfaction levels for the English speaking countries (US, Canada, UK, Australia and New Zealand). Satisfaction in the UK was statistically lower than the others.

I sometimes post information on my blog www.thecustomerinstitute.blogspot.com

Thanks for the blog pointer Bill - I took a quick look there and it seems very interesting and well written. I will surely add it to my follow list.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Francoise Tourniaire on April 9, 2010 at 3:59pm: I grew up in France and have now lived in the US for 30 years and I agree with the earlier posts that it's a cultural difference. Every French school kid knows that a 14/20 grade (grades go from 0 = atrocious to 20=excellent) is an excellent grade. On the other hand, American school kids know that getting an A is absolutely feasible (and required by some mean parents). So for a French respondent, giving a "10" on a customer satisfaction survey, regardless of the quality of service, is not a natural thing to do.

That being said, I would suggest using self-benchmarks. Your overall c-sat score may be lower in EMEA than in the US but there are individuals in EMEA that are getting high scores. How do they achieve those scores and how can others do the same?; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by David Perrault on April 11, 2010 at 12:29am: Thanks Francoise.

Being French myself, I think I can relate to your point. ;)

Francoise Tourniaire said:
I grew up in France and have now lived in the US for 30 years and I agree with the earlier posts that it's a cultural difference. Every French school kid knows that a 14/20 grade (grades go from 0 = atrocious to 20=excellent) is an excellent grade. On the other hand, American school kids know that getting an A is absolutely feasible (and required by some mean parents). So for a French respondent, giving a "10" on a customer satisfaction survey, regardless of the quality of service, is not a natural thing to do.

That being said, I would suggest using self-benchmarks. Your overall c-sat score may be lower in EMEA than in the US but there are individuals in EMEA that are getting high scores. How do they achieve those scores and how can others do the same?; ▶ Reply to This