Netflix Scores High In Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction with ecommerce websites has rebounded a year after experiencing its first decline since 2004, according to the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI).

The e-commerce sector gained 1.8% to 81.4 on ACSI's 100-point scale, nearly matching its all-time high of 81.6 set in 2007.

The increase in the overall ecommerce sector (made up of e-retail, online brokerage, and online travel industries) is driven by the rebounding online brokerage industry, which climbed 5 percent to 78 after it lost 6 percent last year during a crashing stock market. Both e-retail (1% to 83) and Internet travel (3% to 77) also improved over last year.

"It's no surprise that satisfaction with online brokerages is linked to the stock market. When the market crashes, customers aren't happy. When it recovers, they feel better about their experience," said Claes Fornell, ACSI founder, professor at the University of Michigan.

"But the improvements in e-retail and online travel are a good sign that consumers may be ready to spend again, if they can find the means to do so."

The online financial services industry improved more than any other. Fidelity continues to lead the sector (79) along with Charles Schwab (79). The improvement in the industry overall is largely due to big gains by E*Trade (7% to 74) and TD Ameritrade (7% to 76).

E-retail increased 1 percent to 83 and continues to be the highest scoring industry in the ecommerce sector. Satisfaction with online retail exceeds satisfaction with brick and mortar retail (76). E-retail is the only industry in the ecommerce sector to score above 80, which is considered the starting point for excellence for the Index.  Netflix (2% to 87) leads the Index for the first time, trailed closely by Newegg (86) and Amazon (86).

"The dramatic increase in satisfaction with the e-retail industry over the last ten years has been driven largely by the success of pure-play e-retailers" said Kevin Ertell, Vice President of Retail Strategy at ForeSee Results.

"The retailers who are only selling online have, for the most part, paid better attention to customer needs and expectations and have worked to create a better online software experience for their customers."

Customer satisfaction with online travel increased for the first time in five years, matching its all-time high of 77.

Expedia (79) remains the top-score of the sector.  Priceline experienced the biggest gain increasing 7 percent to 76.
 

 

Netflix Scores High In Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction with ecommerce websites has rebounded a year after experiencing its first decline since 2004, according to the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI).

The e-commerce sector gained 1.8% to 81.4 on ACSI's 100-point scale, nearly matching its all-time high of 81.6 set in 2007.

The increase in the overall ecommerce sector (made up of e-retail, online brokerage, and online travel industries) is driven by the rebounding online brokerage industry, which climbed 5 percent to 78 after it lost 6 percent last year during a crashing stock market. Both e-retail (1% to 83) and Internet travel (3% to 77) also improved over last year.

"It's no surprise that satisfaction with online brokerages is linked to the stock market. When the market crashes, customers aren't happy. When it recovers, they feel better about their experience," said Claes Fornell, ACSI founder, professor at the University of Michigan.

"But the improvements in e-retail and online travel are a good sign that consumers may be ready to spend again, if they can find the means to do so."

The online financial services industry improved more than any other. Fidelity continues to lead the sector (79) along with Charles Schwab (79). The improvement in the industry overall is largely due to big gains by E*Trade (7% to 74) and TD Ameritrade (7% to 76).

E-retail increased 1 percent to 83 and continues to be the highest scoring industry in the ecommerce sector. Satisfaction with online retail exceeds satisfaction with brick and mortar retail (76). E-retail is the only industry in the ecommerce sector to score above 80, which is considered the starting point for excellence for the Index.  Netflix (2% to 87) leads the Index for the first time, trailed closely by Newegg (86) and Amazon (86).

"The dramatic increase in satisfaction with the e-retail industry over the last ten years has been driven largely by the success of pure-play e-retailers" said Kevin Ertell, Vice President of Retail Strategy at ForeSee Results.

"The retailers who are only selling online have, for the most part, paid better attention to customer needs and expectations and have worked to create a better online software experience for their customers."

Customer satisfaction with online travel increased for the first time in five years, matching its all-time high of 77.

Expedia (79) remains the top-score of the sector.  Priceline experienced the biggest gain increasing 7 percent to 76.
 

 

Spam is Getting More Malicious

Symantec has released two new reports for the month of November - the State of Spam, and the State of Phishing (both PDFs). The reports highlight a dramatic increase in spam that contains malware. On top of that, junk and malicious email now accounts for close to 9 out of 10 email messages.

The security firm says that a new generation of "Spam Princes" are rising, and that the Asia Pacific region, Japan, and South America have surpassed North America, with regards to where spam is originating from.

"Rising spam levels originating from South America, Asia Pacific and Japan are not altogether surprising when you consider the massive growth of internet connections in these regions," says Amanda Grady, Principal Analyst, Symantec. "Meanwhile, the increased threats to social networking websites is interesting because it shows spammers are hiding behind the reputation and brand trust built by legitimate companies. Social networking sites that have a large user base will continue to be targets of malicious and phishing emails."

Symantec shares the following findings:

- In October, an average of 1.9% of all spam messages contained malware. This equates to a 0.6% increase from September, when the number of messages containing malware hit a maximum of 4.5% of all spam

- Symantec observed a 17% increase from the previous month in all phishing attacks
 
- 30% of phishing URLs were generated using phishing toolkits; an increase of 24% from the previous month

-  Symantec observed a 45% increase from September in non-English phishing sites
 
- More than 97 Web hosting services were used, which accounted for 8% of all phishing attacks; a decrease of 19% in total Web host URLs when compared to the previous month

Symantec's report of an increase of malware-infected spam is made even more unsettling as news reports surface of computer viruses infecting unknowing victims' machines with child porn.

Have You Read This? 

> Stealth Phishing Attack Looks Like Internal Email

> Symantec Urges Windows Users to Patch Systems

> Beware Holiday Emails

Twitter Most Linked to Social Site in Email Marketing

According to Email Data Source, Twitter has become the most linked to social media outlet in email marketing campaigns. Email Data Source collects, analyzes, organizes, and archives millions of marketing messages to provide competitive intelligence and analytics to the email marketing community.

"In the data Email Data Source has been tracking, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of email marketing campaigns that contain links to Facebook and Twitter," says Bill McCloskey, chairman and co-founder of Email Data Source. "In fact, starting in 2009 twitter.com and facebook.com have become the two most prominent linked to sites in all of email marketing."

So far this year, the number of campaigns with Twitter links has grown to 41,399 (with 41,052 for Facebook) according to the firm. Twitter officially passed Facebook in this regard back in March, they say.

"Since March, Twitter has continued to dominate the email marketplace by being the most prominently linked to website, and the gap between Twitter and Facebook has grown," says Email Data Source. "In June, Twitter was linked to in 9,506 campaigns and Facebook was linked to in 8,636 campaigns."

Those numbers are tremendously higher than they were a couple years ago as you might imagine. The first email campaign with a link to Twitter that was tracked by the firm was back in 2007, and for that entire year, there were 215 email marketing campaigns that linked to it. There were 729 linking to Facebook.