Changes in Purchase Behavior Based on the Customer Experience – Part 1

Every time a company and a customer interact, the customer learns something about the company, and adjusts their behavior based on what they learn.

To explore this proposition, Kinesis conducted a survey of 500 consumers asking them to recall an experience with any provider that they found to be particularly positive or negative, and determined how these customer experiences influenced customer behavior.

When asked to characterize the cause of the positive or negative experience, these customers’ descriptions were grouped into four common themes that mirrored each other regardless of whether the experience was positive or negative.  The most common themes for both experiences were: speed of service, pleasantness of personnel, efficiency of service, and the success of the outcome.

Causes of Positive & Negative Experiences

The speed of service was cited with about the same frequency (7 out of 10 cases) as a cause of the experience being positive or negative.  Pleasantness of personnel was mentioned 70% of the time as a driver of positive experiences compared to 63% for negative.  Efficiency of service (or lack thereof) was more commonly cited as a reason for the experience being negative (71%) compared to positive (60%).  The fourth most common theme mentioned as a reason for the success or failure of the customer experience is the successful outcome of the experience itself (55% for positive experience, 49% for negative).

Again, every time a company and a customer interact, the customer learns something about the company, and adjusts their behavior based on what they learn.  So…how did these experiences (positive or negative) influence customer behavior?

Here is how respondents told us they changed their behavior based on the experience:

Changes in Customer Behavior Based on Experience

Over half of the respondents said they changed their purchase behavior as a result of the experience, 54% of the customers recalling a positive experience told us they purchased more from the provider as a result of the positive experience, while 57% told us they purchased less as a result of the negative experience.

Furthermore, about a third of the respondents told us they considered a change in purchase behavior as a result of the experience; 32% considered purchasing more as a result of the positive experience, and 38% considered purchasing less as a result of a negative experience.

Finally, roughly four out of ten told others of the experience.  Thirty-six percent of participants told us they gave positive word of mouth as a result of the positive experience, while 43% gave negative word of mouth as a result of the negative experience.

Again, every time a company and a customer interact, the customer learns something about the company, and changes their behavior based on what they learn.  The two primary ways customers change their behaviors based on the customer experience is both their own purchase behavior and sharing the experience with others.

The next post in this series explores how customers share the experience with others and the ultimate influence this word of mouth advertising has on others.