Report: How to win over millennial customers
Value and communication are the keys to winning over millennial consumers, according to a survey of 600,000 consumers conducted by J.D. Power.
The 2016 survey polled more than 634,000 consumers, including 126,315 millennials and 246,594 Boomers. Pete Trujillo, senior manager of industry analytics at J.D. Power, hosted a webinar this week to highlight data from the survey, titled "Millennials Insight Report: The Customer Experience Perspective."
The report attempts to explain the makeup and customer experience preferences of millennials -- those born between 1982 and 1994 -- to help companies understand, predict and satisfy the future wants and needs of one of the largest, most unique and ethnically diverse generations in U.S. history.
Trujillo said the nuances that make millennials different from other generations include diversity, economic conditions, education and income. The racial makeup of millennials in the United States is: 56% white-only, 18% Hispanic, 15% black, and 6% Asian, with the remainder being comprised of two or more races, Native Americans and Pacific Islanders. Immigrants make up about 8.7 million of millennials, or 15% of all millennials.
Other key takeaways from the webinar include:
• Millennials are deep researchers by nature: 72% of millennials say that they frequently ask for others’ opinions before they buy something, and seek opinions before making a purchase. Millennials are more apt to conduct independent research using search engines, ratings/reviews sites, and digital social networks to uncover issues that others may have encountered.
• For millennials, most every purchase decision comes down to obtaining value for money. When value is not provided, millennials are more likely than other generations to jump ship to the next best thing.
• Millennials expect products and services to work correctly after purchase, and are more likely than Boomers to contact companies about problems.
• When a problem is resolved, millennials are substantially more likely than Boomers to reuse a product or service. As a result, providing superior customer service is essential to satisfying millennials, and causing them to repurchase or reuse in the future.
• Millennials are not that worried about privacy. Companies should be leveraging social media and data to provide a more automatic and seamless experience.
“Millennials are much more likely to use social media channels to reach out to their favorite brands,” said Jay Meyers, analyst for J.D. Power. “Social media is definitely a channel that companies need to pay attention to because it’s going to be used a lot more in the future.”
Highlights from the report include:
• Millennials Are Not as Fickle or Anti-Establishment as You Think: Overall, across the 15 industries studied, millennials are generally more satisfied consumers (5 points higher, on average, on a 1,000-point scale) than Boomers (born 1946-1964). The difference is most prominent in the utilities (+37 points), healthcare (+28) and telecom (+13) industries.
• Optimism Abounds: Despite having lower accumulated wealth, less income and higher debt than other generations, Millennials are much more optimistic about the economy and their own personal financial outlook.