The Customer Effort Score (CES) is an indicator used to evaluate the level of effort perceived by a customer when he initiates a follow-up with a company (request for information, support, etc.). The aim of this indicator is to better capture the experience experienced by the customer and to optimize certain processes. As with other indicators, the CES is sensitive to cultural dimensions.
The Customer Effort Score was popularized in 2010, following an article published in theHarvard Business Review titled “Stop Delighting your Customers". This indicator relates above all to the customer's evaluation of a contact he initiated:
Request for information,
Managing your account,
Claim,
Customer service.
etc.
This indicator is evaluated by questionnaire, on a scale of 1 to 5:
1 involving a low level of perceived effort (therefore a favorable situation),
5 involving a high level of perceived effort (unfavorable situation).
The level of effort felt of course remains subjective. It can vary from one contact channel to another but also, as we will see here, from one country to another, highlighting cultural variabilities. The results that we share here are those of the same contact center for a financial institution processing requests sent electronically (from the customer interface of the institution's website or app), and this, for several languages. The study made it possible to measure different indicators of the customer experience and we provide here a comparison of the CES by country, according to the actual necessary waiting time (tracked in the system) leading to definitive processing of the customer request.
We can observe that customers' sensitivity to the number of days needed to process their request is different from one country to another:
The amplitude of the CES is different per country,
The perceived effort is different for the same number of days of treatment, but for different countries.
The quality of processing of the request is also comparable (same management, native language contacts, etc.), this result suggests the impact that cultural dimensions can have on the Customer Effort Score, an important point to keep in mind when it comes to comparing countries, customer segments or contact channels.
