More people are buying online, and more companies are being forced into the digital world with their products and customer service. What does that mean for those of us that work with customers directly?

It’s our time to shine! Here are 25 stats that prove the importance of customer experience.Historically, 73% of large companies have surveyed employees about customer experience, but only 45% of executives have seriously considered their employees’ feedback.

Your customer-facing employees are the best when it comes to understanding your customers’ needs. Ask them what they think about how you’re doing, and listen to their answers carefully to improve your CX in the coming year.

86% of buyers are willing to pay more for a better customer experience, but only 1% of them believe that vendors consistently meet those expectations.

2021 is your opportunity to rise to the occasion and start meeting those needs. Not only will it benefit your customers and their relationship with you, but it will help your bottom line.

If your company has a poorly designed mobile experience, 57% of customers wouldn’t recommend you to their colleagues, and 50% of them will stop visiting it, even if they enjoy your products.

If you haven’t focused on creating an excellent mobile experience yet, 2021 is the time to do it.

The estimated cost in the United States of customers switching products due to a bad experience is $1.6 trillion.

With everything going digital, it is easier than ever for your customers to find competitors that treat them better than you do. Don’t let yourself get caught up.

Consumers are willing to pay 16% more for products and services from brands that provide an excellent customer experience.

Start to market your customer experience as part of your product, and your customers will be more willing to pay additional cash for their improved experiences.

Only 23% of B2B marketers claim to have a customer-centric organization rather than a channel- or product-centric one.

Now is the time to shift your focus across the board to your customers. Instead of just using your customer support and customer success organizations to drive this change, infuse other teams, too. Marketing has enormous potential to change their customer-centricity in their content—instead of talking about the product features, talk about how specific customers are using them.

58% of people that work in this industry plan to use customer service as a jumping-off point for other careers.

It’s a bad sign when people are using an opportunity just to move on to another. Take the time to make your customer support and customer success people feel valued and essential. When you empower them to make real change, you’ll notice your customer experience improving, too. Invested employees do better work.

70% of buying experiences are based on how customers feel they are being treated, rather than anything metrics-based.

To your customers, your NPS and CSAT scores don’t matter. What matters is how your customers feel after they’ve used your product or trial. In 2021 focus on creating more human interactions that feel good.

More than half of all internet traffic comes from mobile, but 90% of customers report that they have a bad experience if they try to engage a company’s customer experience team over mobile devices.

What are the channels that you have optimized for customers to use to reach out to you? Are any of them mobile friendly? If not, now is the time to change that. Customers care about reaching out to you everywhere, and mobile is a massive part of that.

Loyal customers are five times as likely to repurchase your product and forgive for a mistake, seven times as likely to try a new product offering, and four times as likely to refer a friend or colleague.

It’s better for both parties if you have a healthy relationship. Taking the time to build on your customer experience is valuable in that it makes customers more willing to see themselves as a partner to you, rather than you in service to them.

A 10% increase in customer retention leads to a 30% increase overall in the company’s value.

The way your customers are engaging with your product has more value than many companies realize. Just a small increase in customer retention can change dividends to the overall value of your company. Along with CAC and LTV, customer retention should be one of your top metrics for 2021.

Research has shown that there is an 80% increase in revenue when businesses focus on customer experience.

Beyond the base value of the company, you increase your revenue when you focus on your customers. Who doesn’t want more income in 2021?

72% of customers that have positive experiences with a product will share their story with six or more people. That said, if they have a bad experience, 13% will share the experience with 15+ people.

People like to talk. Wouldn’t you want to support them in sharing good things around your brand? The more poor your customers’ experience, the more likely they are to shout it from the rooftops. Less is more here. Keep your customers happy in 2021 and avoid bad publicity.

Customer journey analysis is now the most valuable conversion rate optimization method.

Do you already have the customer journey mapped at your organization? Instead of focusing on NPS or CES to understand your conversion points, look at your map. It will tell you the exact valuable moments in your customers’ journey and what they want more (or less). Use that to direct where you spend your energy.

Supermarket chains provide the best customer experience overall, while TV and Internet service providers give the worst.

Supermarkets have put lots of effort into figuring out what their customers want and how to reach them effectively. TV and internet services are usually among the few options that a customer has. In contrast, supermarkets and grocery stores recognize that the competitive landscape is deluged with other chains their customers could pick from. Use your customer experience to create additional value for your customers outside of the product itself.

The research found that 1 in 3 customers will leave a beloved brand after a single bad experience, and 92% would abandon a product or service after two or three negative interactions. Moreover, the latest Hiver report discovered that 72% of Customers Switch Brands after a Negative Experience

Even if you take the time to build up your relationship with customers, you can quickly lose it if you drop the ball. Take opportunities to find the bottlenecks in your experience, and fix any problems before you start to lose your customers.

87% of organizations agree that traditionally good customer experiences are no longer enough to satisfy customers.

You need to go above and beyond to please your customers, especially with many competitors in the broader landscape. It’s no longer just about having fast response times or giving away discounts and treats. You need to offer a superior customer experience to wow and maintain your userbase.

49% of customers have made impulse purchases after receiving an excellent, personalized experience with a brand.

Impulse purchases aren’t just for Instagram advertising anymore. By personalizing your customers’ experiences, you may open your ability to drive impulse or in-the-moment purchases.

AI and machine learning automate 25% of all customer interactions. This number is slated to grow to 40% by 2023.

Take a load off your customer-facing teams and implement some bots or AI to lift some of the load or deflect conversations. It’ll free your team up to focus on more impactful work while the bots collect the low-hanging fruit.

48% of consumers expect companies to give them specialized treatment and incentives for being a good customer.

Your customers feel like they deserve for you to treat them. Consider ways to do this in the coming year: perhaps offering a discount for annual subscriptions or long-term usage. For instance, if they’ve used your product for two years, maybe send them a teeshirt. Find what compels your customers, and give it to them as a “treat” for their loyalty.

57% of customers say that they wouldn’t recommend a brand with a poor mobile experience.

If anything is clear, you need to nail down your mobile strategy into the new year. Not only will people leave your product if your mobile experience or mobile support is terrible—they’ll also speak poorly of your brand. Yikes!

Customer experience technologies will cost businesses $641 billion by 2022.

The value of a good customer experience is represented well in the amount of money that businesses are willing to spend. The industry as a whole will be worth multiple billions of dollars by the end of 2021!

65% of companies measure NPS to understand their customer experience, compared with 44% that measure CSAT and 14% that measure CES.

NPS is one of the most common ways companies understand how their customers feel about their experiences with their product. In 2021, try to get a handle on your baseline NPS and start setting benchmarks for progress as the year goes on.

70% of customers believe that excellent customer experience needs to be fast, convenient, and helpful. It also must do all of those things while still being friendly.

It’s like the iron triangle of engineering: quality, speed, and new features. But, it’s the square of your interactions being fast, convenient, helpful, and friendly for customer experience. There are no trade-offs, and you have to meet all of them to be successful.

Companies with an excellent omnichannel experience enjoy a 10% year-on-year growth.

Omnichannel has been around for a while, but it’s growing increasingly important as time goes on. Your customers want to have the same experience no matter where they are connecting with you from. If you haven’t already jumped into an omnichannel strategy, 2021 is your time to do it.

34% of consumers feel that customer service should be more responsive and empathetic due to the pandemic.

Stats, stats, stats!

Stats are hugely helpful when it comes to understanding how your peers compare to you. Use these 25 statistics to help inform your plan for 2021 and validate the importance of your company’s customer experience. For a few things to focus on, consider mobile as an increasingly vital environment to support your customers. Beyond that, try to provide a consistent experience across all platforms.

Your customers are expecting excellence, and it’s up to you to give it to them. Your unhappy customers will be vocal about it, but your happy customers have a significant impact on retention, baseline growth, and overall company value. Go forth and create incredible experiences!

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