Cultural Implications of Customer Satisfaction

As I have noted in the past, I have access to a very large data base of customer satisfaction surveys. I recently published an article in the Business Renaissance Quarterly, Spring, 2008 titled "An Examination of the Cultural Implications of Customer Satisfaction in the High Technology Industry." Rather that try to summarize it in this blog, I am blogging the abstract.

Abstract
Customer satisfaction has become a very important aspect of business management in the high technology market. Companies that provide products and services worldwide often are concerned that customer satisfaction may be impacted by cultural differences. This study examines measures of customer satisfaction in areas around the world to determine whether or not there is a difference in satisfaction scores provided by Help Desks. A sample of more than 150,000 surveys from 9 companies in the computer and medical electronics areas was used. The statistical results at a 95% confidence level indicate there is a difference in customer perception in Help Desk technical support. The results clearly indicate that companies need to understand these differences in order to optimize the use of their resources and to adjust their service offerings to respond to their different customer needs and expectations.

This article is the first of a series that will be developed with more granularity. While this study looks at the more global picture, the next article will focus on countries rather than geography and may include other areas of service such as field service and depot repair.