Report: E-tailers beat omnichannel peers in customer satisfaction

Chicago — Pure-play e-tailers are doing a better job in satisfying their customers overall than omnichannel retailers, but omnichannel retailers have an edge in select functional areas like checkout. According to results of the mid-year Customer Feedback Index (CFI) from OpinionLab, e-tailers had an average CFI score of 481, compared with a CFI average of 457 for omnichannel retailers.

However, omnichannel retailers still beat e-tailers in functional mean ratings for individual aspects of customer service, such as home page, service and support, products and checkout. Meanwhile, customers were more satisfied with e-tailers in the functional areas, including search, account and information. Interestingly, both subsets of the retail sector covered by the report had overall CFI scores below the industrywide average of 557.

Individual retailers that scored exceptionally well in the CFI include Guitar Center, whose CFI score of 570 is among the best of all omnichannel retailers, and Newegg, whose CFI score of 645 outperformed the e-tail average by 34%.