2010 Customer Complaint Index - Web Liquid

This is the 2010 Customer Complaint Index

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The influence of complaints Before the Internet, where did we go to qualify our purchases? Consumer Reports magazine built a following by empowering readers with its valuable critical insight. Verticalized resources like Kelley Blue Book took a similar approach. In lieu of these resources, we asked our family, friends, coworkers, or anyone else with knowledge of the product or service. But unfortunately, in many cases we simply skipped this step all together, and dove into purchases without a clear understanding of what we were in for.

Nowadays, we have a slew of tools at our disposal, not least of which are search engines. According to a December 2008 study by TNS, 63% of adult internet users worldwide research a product/service online before buying ("Digital World, Digital Life"). Similar research from ORC found 61% of respondents consulting online reviews, blogs and other sources of online customer feedback before purchasing a new product or service – with search engines being the preferred method of conducting the research ("Online Consumer Reviews Significantly Impact Consumer Purchasing Decisions"). Five out of six (83%) reported that this research had some level of influence on their purchase decisions.

Poor customer service: does it make for good marketing? Customer service can be traditionally seen as a organizational cost center. Delivering at a high level requires good people with thorough training and constant access to up-to-date resources. They spring into action after the sale, to make sure that customers are kept happy. Corporations invest countless millions of dollars to get it right, because they know how profoundly at can affect the sales cycle, and the long-term growth prospects of the company.

But are we taking full advantage of the marketing opportunity tied to customer service?

Consumer behavior in search engines can shed light on this. Given the sizable number of Google queries related to customer complaints, a variety of trends emerge to answer the question above. We’ll show you the brands which receive the dubious distinction of making the list, which of them should really be concerned about it, and where the marketer’s opportunities lie.

If someone searches for complaints related to a brand, what does it really mean?

Most likely, this search behavior traces back to one of a few root causes:

• the consumer is considering a variety of brands prior to purchasing, and would like to educate him/herself on the potential pitfalls of each • the consumer has heard horror stories about the brand's customer service record, and is curious to learn more • the consumer has experienced one of these horror stories, and would like to find out where they can formally register these complaints, making them public for the world to see

There are two common denominators in each of the aforementioned scenarios:

• the brand's poor performance is put in the spotlight • the consumer is proactively calling on the experiences of other consumers

Contextualizing Complaint Queries

The Customer Complaint Index is our effort to understand customer complaints, specifically the search behavior that drives them, and the marketing opportunity surrounding them.

We begin with three research objectives.

1) Which brands are most commonly searched in Google for customer complaints?

2) Which industries attract this type scrutiny from consumers?

3) To what extent are advertisers capitalizing on opportunities to extend marketing reach around complaint-focused search behavior?

Objectives

What did we look for? We chose to study 35 brands across a variety of industries, including automotive, consumer packaged goods, entertainment, retail, electronics & appliances, car rental, foodservice, shipping and software. These brands were identified based on tools provided by Google which identify the top search queries related to “customer complaints,” using both singular and plural queries, i.e. "{brand} customer complaint" and "{brand} customer complaints”. Instances in which Google reported "Not enough data" were recorded with zero values. The full list of brands is available in the Appendix.

The resulting data gave us a brand-by-brand view of absolute search query volumes on a monthly basis. It should be noted that in no way does this research suggest any implications at the click-through level; our focus is simply on “pre-click” query behavior as an indication on consumer intent.

Advertiser competition was also reported by Google, defined as the number of worldwide advertisers bidding on a particular keyword, relative to all keywords across all of Google.

Finally, the data was indexed to broad-matched search query volumes for the brand name by itself, without the aforementioned “customer complaint(s)” modifiers. This gave us a read on what proportion of a brand’s entire search activity could be traced back to a specific interest in customer complaints.

What did we find? In terms of absolute worldwide monthly search queries, we observed what is essentially a dead heat for the top spot, with Nissan (4,686), McDonald’s (4,663) and Hewlett-Packard (4,650) all within 0.1% of each other.

Samsung trailed slightly at 4,413. The rest of the top ten: Ebay, Sony, GE, LG, Hyundai and Microsoft.

When indexing these Customer Complaint Queries to the brand’s overall broad-matched search activity, a very different picture emerged, with General Motors owning the highest relative share of Customer Complaint Queries (1.48 per 1,000 queries). Maytag was a distant second (0.69), with a trio of fast food chains (Burger King, McDonald’s and KFC) rounding out the top five.

In terms of Advertiser Competition, Ebay owned the top spot in terms of share of advertisers bidding on related Customer Complaint keywords. The next six brands on the list were all auto manufacturers: Hyundai, Nissan, Volkswagen, General Motors, Volkswagen, Audi.

Despite the prominence of automotive brands in each of these sub-analyses, at an industry level, it was Electronics/Appliances which owned the largest share (35%) of Customer Complaint Queries. Automotive ranked second at 24%, followed by Foodservice (18%) and Retail (10%).

Global Monthly Complaint Query Volume

0 1,000 2,000 3,000 4,000 5,000

USPSVolkswagen

IkeaPizzaHut

KFCGeneralMotors

MaytagFedexDisney

BurgerKingMicrosoAHyundai

LGGE

SonyEbay

SamsungHP

McDonald'sNissan

Source: Google.com (2010)

Which brands drive the most Complaint Queries?

Nissan appears in the highest number of Complaint Queries, with McDonald’s and HP very close behind.

The brands with the highest volumes of Customer Complaint Queries span a variety of industries.

What happens when we index these against overall search activity?

Are advertisers taking advantage of the search marketing opportunities around this consumer behavior?

What types of products and services are most prone to the “complaint spotlight”?

That’s what we were wondering, too.

Customer Complaint Index (Complaint Queries per Thousand Brand Queries)

Complaint queries, indexed to all search activity

For every 1,000 queries on Google about General Motors, 1.48 deal with Customer Complaints. No other brand even came close to this figure.

Is the recent performance General Motors’ vehicles actually driving this behavior? Or are there extraneous factors at play, such as their aggressive promotions surrounding the recent “Cash for Clunkers” program?

With some brands, people simply talk about their horror stories because it’s in vogue… if they have an appetite for this information, chances are they know how to search for it.

0.23

0.26

0.33

0.35

0.41

0.44

0.45

0.59

0.69

1.48

0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 1.4 1.6

Subway

RiteAid

GE

Nabisco

Firestone

KFC

McDonald's

BurgerKing

Maytag

GeneralMotors

Source: Google.com (2010)

What about the inherent advertising opportunity?

The automotive industry is capitalizing on advertising opportunities related to Customer Complaints, but Ebay still holds the top spot.

Given its dominance within automotive classified, perhaps Ebay in this chart reflects the large online footprint of Ebay Motors?

If capitalizing on customer service opportunities in search is any indication, advertisers in the automotive space are a relatively savvy lot.

* Advertiser Competition refers to the number of worldwide advertisers bidding on each keyword, relative to all keywords across all of Google. This measure helps advertisers understand how competitive ad placement is for a particular keyword.

44.1%

44.3%

44.4%

44.5%

44.5%

46.3%

49.7%

50.8%

51.1%

59.4%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80%

Maytag

KFC

Samsung

Audi

VW

GeneralMotors

Volkswagen

Nissan

Hyundai

Ebay

Source: Google.com (2010)

Rate of Advertiser Competition

Share of Complaint Queries, by industry vertical

Electronics/Appliances

35.3%

Automotive 24.3%

Foodservice 17.6%

Retail 9.9%

Shipping 4.8%

Software 3.8%

Entertainment 2.9%

Car Rental 1.1%

Packaged Goods 0.1%

What industries are the most scrutinized?

Among the brands studied, more than one-third of Customer Complaint Queries were directed toward Electronics & Appliance manufacturers.

When adding the Automotive and Foodservice verticals, these three segments represent more than three-quarters of all Customer Complaint Queries.

What does this say about consumer behavior? We all have had a bad experience in a store, and we’ve all had a complaint or two about an appliance or electronic gadget – but why would search engines be a more viable feedback outlet only for the latter?

Source: Google.com (2010)

What have we learned? Clearly there is a certain bias to this list, in that high brand appeal correlates, to some degree, with Customer Complaint queries. If a manufacturer makes the best widget in the world, and they sell the largest number of widgets every quarter, they’re still going to have a lot of complaints. Compared to flawless widgets, the share of faulty widgets might be small, but the absolute number could still be high.

And this is precisely why customer service failures can be a gold mine for marketers. If a competitor fails, the marketer has a golden opportunity to step in and save the day. If it’s their own product or service that fails, they can still leverage the situation for data capture, opening a powerful remarketing channel for when the problem is resolved.

In either scenario, the media tends to be cheap, the audience is generally very focused, and for the time being, other advertisers are usually absent.

What have we learned? Despite the fact that Toyota is absent from this list, that may not be true for very long. Consider the recent news affecting Toyota factories and showrooms across the country – a total of eight models were found to have faulty accelerators which posed significant safety risks. On Friday, January 22, 2010, queries for "toyota recall" went through the roof, according to Google Insights for Search:

With an unprecedented degree of interest in this keyword, a major reach opportunity for marketers presented itself – literally overnight. Yet apart from Toyota themselves bidding on that keyword to alert consumers about its new safety advisory, it's a ghost town on the search results pages (see next slide).

Where's Honda reminding us of its impeccable safety record? Where's General Motors telling Americans, "there's more to the GM brand than our customers' complaints?"

What have we learned?

While the Toyota recall is a powerful illustration of competitive positioning opportunities in search marketing, it is by no means unique. Products break down every day. Service failures leave consumers wanting more.

These are the facts of life, and for brands to adapt, the response is twofold:

1) When negative attention (such as customer complaints) is drawn to a competitor, participation in that dialogue can deliver immense value. As Woody Allen famously said, 80% of success is simply showing up.

What have we learned? 2) When negative attention is instead focused on your brand, presence in that forum, and ownership of that dialogue will always pay off over ambivalence. Toyota’s handling of its most recent recall is a good illustration of this approach.

What’s Next?

Just for good measure, have a look at the disparaging comment above from a Twitter user. With the onset of real-time search technology, word of mouth behavior is edging closer and closer to what was once search marketers' no-fly zone.

Stay tuned for more.

http://www.webliquidgroup.com

Appendix Brand Industry

Advertiser Competition

Complaint Query Volume, monthly

Acura Automotive 39.8% 966Audi Automotive 44.5% 1,283Burger King Foodservice 41.2% 1,989Disney Entertainment 25.2% 1,838Dominos Foodservice 0.0% 482Ebay Retail 59.4% 3,762Fedex Shipping 30.2% 1,684Firestone Automotive 0.0% 497GE Electronics/Appliances 43.5% 3,609General Motors Automotive 46.3% 1,478Hertz Car Rental 29.4% 696HP Electronics/Appliances 38.9% 4,650Hyundai Automotive 51.1% 2,536Ikea Retail 31.0% 1,393Infiniti Automotive 43.1% 470John Deere Electronics/Appliances 0.0% 479KFC Foodservice 44.3% 1,469Kroger Retail 1.2% 277Lenovo Electronics/Appliances 37.9% 624LG Electronics/Appliances 43.8% 3,448Maytag Electronics/Appliances 44.1% 1,546McDonald's Foodservice 42.1% 4,663Mercedes Benz Automotive 36.2% 806Microsoft Software 32.9% 2,437Nabisco Packaged Goods 20.0% 86Nissan Automotive 50.8% 4,686Pizza Hut Foodservice 30.1% 1,416Rite Aid Retail 0.0% 386Samsung Electronics/Appliances 44.4% 4,413Sony Electronics/Appliances 41.7% 3,643Staples Retail 0.0% 488Subway Foodservice 16.5% 1,166USPS Shipping 43.9% 1,382Volkswagen Automotive 49.7% 1,393VW Automotive 44.5% 1,283

BrandComplaint Query Volume, monthly

Broad Query Volume, monthly

Complaint Queries per Thousand

General Motors 1,478 1,000,000 1.48Maytag 1,546 2,240,000 0.69Burger King 1,989 3,350,000 0.59McDonald's 4,663 10,360,000 0.45KFC 1,469 3,350,000 0.44Firestone 497 1,220,000 0.41Nabisco 86 246,000 0.35GE 3,609 11,100,000 0.33Rite Aid 386 1,500,000 0.26Subway 1,166 5,000,000 0.23Pizza Hut 1,416 6,120,000 0.23USPS 1,382 6,120,000 0.23Fedex 1,684 7,480,000 0.23Hertz 696 3,350,000 0.21Acura 966 5,000,000 0.19Hyundai 2,536 13,600,000 0.19Infiniti 470 2,740,000 0.17Nissan 4,686 30,400,000 0.15Kroger 277 1,830,000 0.15Dominos 482 4,090,000 0.12Lenovo 624 6,120,000 0.10Staples 488 5,000,000 0.10John Deere 479 6,120,000 0.08LG 3,448 45,500,000 0.08HP 4,650 68,000,000 0.07Microsoft 2,437 45,500,000 0.05Samsung 4,413 83,100,000 0.05Ikea 1,393 30,400,000 0.05VW 1,283 30,400,000 0.04Volkswagen 1,393 37,200,000 0.04Sony 3,643 101,000,000 0.04Disney 1,838 55,600,000 0.03Ebay 3,762 151,000,000 0.02Audi 1,283 55,600,000 0.02Mercedes Benz 806 45,500,000 0.02

Customer Complaint Index, Complaint Queries per Thousand Global Monthly Complaint Query Volume & Advertiser Competition

Appendix

The insights into General Motors warrant a deeper look. This brand consists of many sub-brands. Furthermore, the acronym “GM” is not to be overlooked as a keyword.

We analyzed the volume of customer complaint queries for these sub-brands, and found a monthly total of 618 (compared to 1,478 for “General Motors”). This was calculated off a base of over 139 million broad-matched brand queries, resulting in a much lower index of 0.004 complaint queries per thousand. (Compare this to 1.48 for “General Motors”.)

The conclusion drawn is that the keyword “General Motors” is associated with customer complaints about 370 times more frequently than the aggregation of its sub-brands. In other words, the cars themselves may be performing reasonably well, but as a company, GM is faced with an epic struggle in improving the perception of its corporate brand.

The list included brands with a relationship to General Motors, including those sold in 2009 and those not offered in the United States: Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, Chevy, Daewoo, GMC, GM, Holden, Hummer, Oldsmobile, Opel, Pontiac, Saab, Saturn, and Vauxhall.