NEW YORK (CNN/Money) -
Amazon.com and Sears knew how to treat their online customers right, while Payless ShoeSource and Safeway have lessons to learn, a study said Wednesday.
As more people shop online, Internet retailers need to be more concerned with whether customers have a positive shopping experience, the independent research firm Customer Respect Group said in the study.
"It is interesting to see the growing correlation between the top performers in the CRI (customer respect index) to the top revenue performers," said group president Terry Golesworthy in a statement released with the study.
"Customers buy from Web sites that they trust and where they believe their dollars and, just as key, their personal information is safest," Golesworthy said.
While the survey's findings are not definitive, Amazon.com (down $0.37 to $41.77, Research) did top the group's CRI among specialty retailers and overall, and the company saw its busiest holiday season to date.
The online retailer also set a single-day record just before Christmas with more than 2.8 million items ordered worldwide, equal to about 32 items a second, and it expects 2004 to be its best holiday sales season ever in terms of overall sales.
Amazon depends on positive customer experiences for much of its growth, said Amazon spokeswoman Patty Smith. "We don't do traditional advertising, so word of mouth is very important to us," she said.
Sears (down $1.40 to $50.40, Research) was the top-rated general merchandiser, followed by Wal-Mart (up $0.07 to $53.29, Research) and Kohl's (up $0.38 to $48.08, Research).
Macy's and May Department Stores (up $0.08 to $29.14, Research) were at the bottom of the list. Neither company could be reached for comment.
Kroger (down $0.14 to $16.55, Research) led food and drug stores and Safeway (down $0.21 to $18.66, Research) was at the bottom of the list.
The survey reflects how top, often-shopped at retailers stack up against one another, not whether a site is necessarily good or bad. For example, Safeway online sales and customer satisfaction feedback are healthy and growing, said a company executive.
"We have doubled both our online sales and customer count year-on-year," Mitch Rhodes, CEO of Safeway.com, told CNN/Money.
"And we survey 10 percent of all our customers on an ongoing basis -- after they've placed their orders and after delivery. Of that number, 90.6 percent have said they would shop at our site again," Rhodes said.
Customer care means better sales
Retailers' Web sites are growing more concerned with how they treat customers, one reason the online holiday shopping season was so strong, the study said. Reports indicate online sales rose as much as 25 percent this season with the industry now worth about $23 billion, Golesworthy said.
According a Sears spokesman, 2003 was a watershed year in Internet sales, with more women than men shopping online for the first time.
"You've seen that trend really help us this year. More of our traditional customer base is shopping on the Internet," said Chris Shimojima, vice president of merchandising and marketing at Sears.
"Throughout the year we saw 40 to 50 percent year-on-year growth in online sales," he said.
Shimojima added that the company's image as dependable and trustworthy helped them lure online customers early.
During the holiday period -- from Nov. 1 to Dec. 25 -- retail sites claimed 9.1 percent of all U.S. Internet visits, research group Hitwise said.
The Customer Respect Group measures a company's attitude towards its customers based on the site's ease of use, company responsiveness to problems, transparency and privacy.
The group also ranks whether a site abuses access to customer data like e-mail addresses and phone numbers, and attitudes toward the consumer.
The study used interviews with users and multiple site visits to determine a site's customer-friendliness.
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