Cellular Retailers Must Greet Customers within 30 Seconds: Study

By Allan Pulga

A simple hello can go a long way in wireless retail, but a recent J.D. Power and Associates customer satisfaction study makes a startling case for the conventional in-store greeting. The study found that overall customer satisfaction declines considerably if customers’ wait time (the time before customers are greeted upon entry) exceeds 30 seconds.

This finding is particularly poignant since the average wait time among wireless retail stores is about five minutes. According to the study, customers who are approached within 30 seconds of entering the store provide a satisfaction score 86 points higher (on a 1,000-point scale) than customers not greeted within 30 seconds.

Currently, only 39 percent of wireless customers report being greeted within 30 seconds, while customers who are not greeted promptly are 32 percent less likely to visit that store again.

Time spent waiting to speak to a salesperson is also critical, say J.D. Power and Associates, as overall satisfaction declines considerably when that wait time exceeds one minute. Only 28 percent of customers report speaking with a salesperson within one minute of entry.

“With fewer new wireless customers entering the market, the wireless industry is becoming fiercely competitive for retailers,” said Kirk Parsons, senior director of wireless services at J.D. Power and Associates, in a release.

“Wireless carrier retail stores (and independent dealers) face strong competition from national electronic retail outlets such as Best Buy, Circuit City and Radio Shack, which tend to perform better in initially greeting customers. It’s imperative that wireless (retailers) concentrate on setting the proper expectations and provide customers with a timely and efficient sales transaction.”

Efficient sales transactions are also important since the study found that wireless retail transaction time goes up, customer satisfaction goes down. The average wireless retail transaction takes nearly an hour to complete, from customer entry to store to paperwork completion and product delivery. 

Other key findings:

• Overall customer satisfaction with major wireless carrier-branded stores was based on four factors:
  • sales staff (51%)
  • store display (17%)
  • store facility (16%)
  • price/promotion (16%)
• Among customers who visited a wireless retail store in the past six months, almost half (46%) did so to renew or change an existing wireless plan.
  • another 16 percent were first-time wireless customers
• Retail satisfaction declines by 104 points among customers who report they were pressured during the sales process.