Customer Experience Benchmarking - Honda

In 2007, RXP undertook a Customer Experience benchmarking review for this leading motor company. We carried out Mystery Shopping of Honda and a range of competitors so that the Customer Experience could be benchmarked and improvements made.

This approach focused on:

Understanding how well our client provided customer support by telephone, web and email – and organises itself around the needs of the customer;
Benchmarking Customer Experience against motor industry rivals and ‘best in class’ service providers;
Identifying a series of Quick Wins that could be implemented quickly.

Benchmarking

The technique of Mystery Shopping was based on using both prospect and customer scenarios across telephone, web and email channels for Honda and all seven other companies. The benchmark companies selected included three rival motor manufacturers plus four other companies who service proposition was regarded as good.

Emirates – as an example of a highly promoted airline focused on ‘economy’ customers;
Innocent Drinks - as a fast growing company in the FMCG sector;
Ideal Standard – as a multi-product manufacturing company who manages consumers through a distribution network
John Lewis – as a well respected customer orientated organisation.

Mystery Shopping

For each company, Mystery Shopping was undertaken by our consultants across a range of scenarios for relevant product types. Each telephone call was assessed against the criteria of:

- access i.e. how quickly the call was routed to the right person;
- product knowledge of the call centre Advisor;
- the effectiveness with which information is captured and fulfillment is completed;
- and the empathy displayed by the Advisor in understanding the caller needs.

Acting on the results

The results were used by Honda to:

Spot and act upon sales opportunities
Become more connected with their dealers
Improve response times to email enquiries
and, most importantly, to reinforce and differentiate the Honda brand values

Steve Dyer, Head of Customer Operations, Honda UK commented "the benchmarking approach allowed us to compare ourselves with others and then make improvements. As a result, we now know that Honda provides better call handling for our customers".

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