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How satisfied are we with our service providers?

Guest post by: Alex Khaikin

Article Overview: MaCorr Research has recently conducted a study to better understand consumer satisfaction with subscription based industries. Traditional newspaper or magazine subscriptions, along with emergency car services, enjoy the highest consumer satisfaction, while cellular phone and cable or satellite TV service providers have noticeably lower level of satisfaction among subscribers.

How satisfied are we with our service providers?

MaCorr Research has recently conducted a study to better understand consumer satisfaction with the following subscription based industries:

- Internet

- Cable or satellite TV

- Traditional news paper or magazine

- Emergency car services or road side assistance

- Satellite radio

- Cellular phone

Traditional news paper or magazine subscriptions, along with emergency car services or road side assistance, enjoy the highest consumer satisfaction.

9 out of 10 subscribers are very satisfied with the services overall. 90% and 86% of the respondents, respectively, are satisfied with "value for the money" they receive.

More than 4 out of 5 (85% and 86% of the respondents, respectively) are very likely to renew the subscription with the current provider at the end of the term.

On the other hand, cellular phone and cable or satellite TV service providers have noticeably lower level of satisfaction among subscribers. 64% and 68% of the respondents, respectively, are satisfied with the services overall.

3 out of 5 (about 60% of the respondents) are satisfied with "value for the money" and less than 60% (56% and 58% of the respondents, respectively) would likely to recommend the provider to a colleague or friend.

The survey was conducted among statistically representative sample of current subscribers in North America. The satisfaction with measured on a 10 points scale, with 1 being very dissatisfied and 10 - very satisfied.

More information on this and other surveys can be found on MaCorr Research blog.

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Article Tags: customer satisfaction survey, customer survey, online survey



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Re: Hi from Greenville, SC - Welcome Philip - from my experience in working with different merchant service providers I've found the following criteria to be important: 1) Price - at the end of the day it's very competitive industry and you don't need to be the cheapest option but you can't be too far ahead of the other guys. Automatic volume discounts are also much appreciated. Ones I've been involved with in the past give you volume discounts only if you apply. 2) Service - are you available when I need you? If I call will you be available and help me right away? If I email will you get back to me quickly? People often don't need service from their merchant service provider. It's one of those things where as long as it's working we tend to forget about you running in the background. But when there's a problem it's usually a big problem because we can't get money so we need fast and good quality service. 3) Integration support. Help people get set up. Even offer to do it for them - now that's a great way you can stand out. The integration support from most merchant service providers is terrible. You're pretty much on your own to figure out how their APIs work. I hope that helps - good luck!
Viral marketing campaign - Thanks for the generous offer Susan. Have you considered building an affiliate program? I'm not sure if ClickBank or Commission Junction would take on that kind of service instead of a product based company but it's worth investigating. If you can't go with them it could be worth your time developing your own affiliate program. Another good place to start is with satisfied customers. Someone who is happy with your work knows others who could benefit from your service. Usually all they need is someone to ask them to refer a friend!
Re: Hi from Greenville, SC - [quote="Evan":39hn23oh]Welcome Philip - from my experience in working with different merchant service providers I've found the following criteria to be important: 1) Price - at the end of the day it's very competitive industry and you don't need to be the cheapest option but you can't be too far ahead of the other guys. Automatic volume discounts are also much appreciated. Ones I've been involved with in the past give you volume discounts only if you apply. 2) Service - are you available when I need you? If I call will you be available and help me right away? If I email will you get back to me quickly? People often don't need service from their merchant service provider. It's one of those things where as long as it's working we tend to forget about you running in the background. But when there's a problem it's usually a big problem because we can't get money so we need fast and good quality service. 3) Integration support. Help people get set up. Even offer to do it for them - now that's a great way you can stand out. The integration support from most merchant service providers is terrible. You're pretty much on your own to figure out how their APIs work. I hope that helps - good luck![/quote:39hn23oh] I find all of these to be true on a daily basis. I have a strong hold in my particular area. Fast service is imperative. If I can get a restaurant a new terminal in a couple of hours as compared to the fastest national company(at least overnight) then I win. Being local is huge in my industry. I have successfully managed accounts is other areas. Usually I give them a back-up terminal so if the other one breaks down they can switch out the two ship the broken one to me and have a new back-up the next day. I have done a few online accounts. It is not my specialty though. I have found it to not be too hard if you are using a CMS and your host is at least fair. We can integrate with almost every website. It is usually as easy as dropping a pem file in the correct folder in cpanel. For more difficult ones I have a webmaster that I consult with. Price is the last one. Price is always the biggest. You cant give it away or you have no way to give good service. How apt am I to give back-up terminals or make sure I have 24 hour customer service if the margins don't support it? At the same time I have to be very competitive especially when landing large accounts. I made things too easy on one of my large accounts one time I guess. They thought all providers were like me so when they got a quote for less they switched. 11 days later they called me to help them get their machines downloaded back to my companies settings and their website was completely messed-up. I had to delete everything in the file and reload a back-up I had.
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