Consumers e-mailing queries to some large companies via their Web
sites could probably get a more rapid response by driving to the
airport, booking a flight to the company's headquarters and talking
to a customer representative there, a new study reveals.
In its study of online "consumer respect", Internet research
company ConsumerRespect.com, a division of International Ventures
Research, found that not only are many US Fortune 100 companies
slow at responding to general online enquiries, 37% do not reply at
all.
The study rated Fortune 100 companies' overall online "consumer
respect," based on factors such as privacy, principles, attitude,
transparency, simplicity and responsiveness that consumers
encounter at the companies' sites.
Energy group PG&E and Ford ranked among the worst in terms of
responsiveness, while Freddie Mac, Costco Wholesale and Verizon
Communications rated among the best.
In terms of attitude, Hewlett-Packard and Costco did the best,
while AOL Time Warner and Electronic Data Systems ranked the worst,
the study said.
"What surprised me is some of the simple things that people got
wrong," said Donal Daly, author of the report.
Of all the attributes ranked, the companies performed the lowest in
terms of responsiveness, recording a 4.8 rating out of 10.
Forty-one percent of the companies replied to inquiries within 48
hours, while just 9% received a perfect score in terms of
responsiveness.
While some of the 37% of companies that failed to reply to
enquiries did send auto-responders that the consumer's enquiry was
received, this was not the trend. According to the study, 83% of
sites offered no auto-response function.
This lack of online consumer respect is a big mistake, according to
Daly, given that customers who tend to use the Internet are more
valuable to companies because they are usually younger and offer
the companies the ability to build lifetime brand loyalty.
In a time when corporate mistrust is rampant - given the implosion
of Enron and accounting problems within other major firms -
regaining consumer confidence is imperative, Daly said.
AOL Time Warner was marked down because of its attitude rating. The
company did not respond to an e-mail enquiry, had a difficult to
read privacy policy and was not clear about its practices, Daly
noted.
Privacy was also rated, with Lowe's Companies scoring high and
American Electric Power coming in last. Companies still have a way
to go in terms of protecting consumer privacy, given that 15% of
the companies surveyed sell customer data without seeking
permission to do so, according to the report. Daly said he was
surprised to find that a handful of Fortune 100 companies did not
have privacy policies on their sites.
When asked why some companies were giving online customers such
little respect, Daly proffered the adage "on the Internet no one
can hear you scream". "Companies lose customers but they don't know
about it," he said. "They don't hear the screams, and everyone
loses."
The term "Fortune 100" refers to the top companies in
Fortune magazine's listing of top 500 US-based corporations
with the largest revenue in the last year.
The survey was performed as part of ConsumerRespect.com's 2002
Online Customer Respect Study of Fortune 100 Companies. More
details are available on the firm's site at
www.customerrespect.com.