Theory Of Customer Satisfaction

Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction is a term in marketing which refers to a measure of the degree in which a product or service that a company produce or provide meets a customer’s expectations. The more satisfied a customer is, the happier they are with the goods purchased or services obtained from the company. Customer satisfaction is influenced by some factors—sometimes even when they have no direct connection with the business. Customers can have a low level of satisfaction when they are in a bad mood, or when they expected a level of service that the business was famous for, but failed to achieve. Usually, the CSAT (Customer Satisfaction Score) is measured through surveys and questionnaires.

It is easier to conduct a survey nowadays,

Customer satisfaction program can help one determine the key drivers of customer’s satisfaction, items that make the greatest contribution to the driver and the overall satisfaction level’s effect on one’s business outcomes. Identifying specific level of performance helps one set targets, allocate one’s resources more effectively and focus on objectives congruent with customers’ expectations.

Theory of Customer Satisfaction

Many theories have been used to understand the process through which customers form satisfaction judgements. For example, consistency theory suggests that when the expectations and the actual product performance do not match, the customer will feel some degree of tension. In order to relieve this tension, the customer will make changes either in their expectations or in the perceptions of the product’s actual performance. Four theoretical approaches have been developed under consistency theory such as Assimilation theory, Contrast theory, Assimilation-contrast theory and Negativity

The queue shuffles along quickly, the employee behind the cashier register performs her duties, smiles, hands over the change, and wishes the customer a great day. The next day, the customer returns to the store to make the same purchase again.

From the illustration above, does the customer have loyalty towards the coffe shop? Or does the customer simply a satisfied customer? Customer satisfaction is quite similar to customer loyalty but actually they are different. Using the illustration from above, the customer is satisfied with the business. The customer is loyal if there is a new coffee shop opens the following week, with discounted price for the same coffee, and yet the customer chose to continue visiting the same shop.

Beyond these obvious difference, there are more important distinctions. Costumer satisfaction is more of a backwards-looking metric, it is affected by how a customer feels about his or her last purchase. Customer satisfaction can grow rapidly but it can disappear even facter after a bad service or defective product. Customer loyalty is forward-looking, an indicator of future behavior. It takes time to grow and slow to decline too, making it suitable to predict future behavior than customer