Canadian brands revamped customer experiences to match changing needs and expectations due to COVID-19

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., June 3, 2021 — Forrester’s (Nasdaq: FORR) Canada 2021 Customer Experience Index (CX Index™) reveals that customer experience quality among Canadian brands remained stable, despite the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic changed customer needs and expectations in unprecedented ways. This is why brands maintaining stable CX quality is an achievement. Additionally, investment firms dominated the elite brands — the top 5% of brands in the entire CX Index — with RBC Dominion Securities, ScotiaMcLeod, and TD Wealth reaching this category for the first time.

CX Index data further reveals that emotion remains core to brands’ CX success: Elite brands provide nearly four times more emotionally positive customer experiences, such as feeling appreciated and respected, which are critical to boosting loyalty. In the retail industry, for example, among customers who felt appreciated, 85% plan to stay with the brand, 82% plan to increase spending with the brand, and 85% will advocate for the brand.

“Brands achieved an important milestone this past year by largely sustaining CX quality despite the pandemic driving historic changes in consumer behaviors,” said Harley Manning, VP and research director with Forrester. “The pandemic has also demonstrated that brands must differentiate themselves by recognizing human emotions. Our findings validate that, across every industry, how customers feel when interacting with brands strongly influences their loyalty toward those brands.”

Conducted for the seventh year in a row, Forrester’s Canada 2021 CX Index results are benchmarked on a survey of more than 38,000 Canadian customers across 97 brands and nine industries. Forrester’s CX Index methodology helps CX leaders grow revenue faster, drive higher brand preference, and charge more for their products. Forrester’s CX Index helps brands identify the key drivers of a positive CX for their customers to prioritize efforts. Even a minor improvement to a brand’s customer experience quality can add tens of millions of dollars of revenue by reducing customer churn and increasing share of wallet. Additionally, superior CX leads to reduced service costs and lowers the cost of customer acquisition through word of mouth.

Resources:

  • Register to attend CX North America 2021 to learn about how to measure and benchmark journeys to drive emotional engagement and more.
  • Read more about the results of Forrester’s Canada 2021 CX Index.
  • Learn about Forrester Decisions for customer experience leaders.
  • Download Forrester’s Canada 2021 CX Index report (client access required).
  • Check out how to revitalize CX measurement and prioritization.

About Forrester’s CX Index

Forrester’s CX Index connects quality and loyalty measures with revenue models, giving leaders the ability to guide CX investments that produce the greatest revenue return.

About Forrester

Forrester (Nasdaq: FORR) is one of the most influential research and advisory firms in the world. We help leaders across technology, marketing, customer experience, product, and sales functions use customer obsession to accelerate growth. Through Forrester’s proprietary research, consulting, and events, leaders from around the globe are empowered to be bold at work — to navigate change and put their customers at the center of their leadership, strategy, and operations. Our unique insights are grounded in annual surveys of more than 675,000 consumers, business leaders, and technology leaders worldwide; rigorous and objective research methodologies, including Forrester Wave™ evaluations; over 52 million real-time feedback votes; and the shared wisdom of our clients. To learn more, visit Forrester.com.