Dive Brief:

• Customer experience quality deteriorated 5% in 2023 from 2022, according to a report from KPMG released Tuesday. KPMG surveyed 10,000 customers across 282 brands.

• “That’s the most significant drop we’ve seen in the past decade,” Jeff Mango, managing director and CX lead of KPMG LLP, told CX Dive. 

• One reason for the decline is the complicated market companies are working in, Mango said. Once Gen Z entered the workforce before the pandemic, companies had five generations of workers serving five generations of customers with varying needs and preferences, not to mention a large digital divide.

Dive Insight:

Businesses are falling short on meeting customer expectations.

During the pandemic, companies went above and beyond to serve and engage customers. But in the post-pandemic world, companies have cut back on some of those forms of service and engagement, and customers have expressed dissatisfaction.

Prior to the pandemic, “it wasn't uncommon for my mother to sit on the phone and wait for an 1-800 rep for 20 minutes,” Mango said. “But then they started using chat or self-service tools and ordering through an app and they became more savvy.”

“That has created a pretty significant swing in expectations,” he said. 

Mango says the deterioration of CX quality is not a reason to despair. Instead, it's a wake-up call. Customer expectations have increased, and good CX requires consistent investment.

“In order for you to beat your competition and have profitable growth, you must continue to invest in your experience or you will continue to see problems going forward,” he said