Latin American customers compared to US and Canada

How Latin American customers compare to those in the US and Canada
Younger Latins more likely to contact consumer departments

Latin American consumers contacting customer affairs are substantially younger than US and Canadian consumers who contact similar departments.

That is one of the key findings in the Connecting to the Americas Benchmarking Study conducted recently by Entrevista, a division of The Center For Client Retention (TCFCR.) In total, over 16,000 consumers who had contacted the consumer affairs departments of 14 major US-based consumer product companies – across a variety of industries – participated in the research.

The study found that slightly less than half of the consumers who participated from Latin America were less than 35 years of age, compared to approximately 15 percent for US and Canada.

“While this finding might be somewhat surprising, it is consistent with the age demography of Latinos living in the US at 27 years of age, compared to the average age for US consumers at 40, and Canadian at 39.5,” states Richard Shapiro, president of TCFCR/Entrevista, and a specialist in customer retention.

As a result of this finding, Shapiro recommends that companies – who are promoting their brands in these newly emerging markets – welcome their new consumers to their brand families.

“By telling consumers that you are grateful that they have selected your brand, it will communicate customer appreciation and instill a feeling that the company truly values their business. Brand loyalty for consumers in Latin America needs to be created, as opposed to those in the US and Canada where, in general, the relationship with the brand needs to be maintained or expanded.”

Study highlights:
– Approximately 75 percent of the respondents from Latin America engage in social media sites, compared to slightly fewer than 60 percent for US and Canada

– Nearly two-thirds of the consumers shared their comments about the interaction, with 85 percent being either positive or neutral in nature

– Although the overall satisfaction for respondents in Latin America was somewhat less than for US or Canadian consumers, consumers from Latin America were serviced by contact centers in Mexico, Brazil, Columbia, Argentina, etc. and each country has unique cultural and language differences which does present additional challenges over and above responding to the consumers’ question and/or concern

The overall satisfaction for email-initiated responses was slightly lower than for those consumers who had initiated their contacts via the telephone for the US, Canadian and Latin American markets. However, Shapiro recommends that companies who respond to consumer inquiries via email employ more phrases such as “we are so glad you reached out to us,” “we greatly appreciate you, our loyal customer,” and “we are so happy that you decided to try our new brand and that you like it so much.”

These types of phrases will assist in conveying a more welcoming feeling to the consumer. Shapiro adds that companies – in an effort to better connect with consumers – should always extend a “personal flair”, especially in situations where there is no human interaction.

“The data collected from this study offers insight on the variances between satisfaction and loyalty for consumers in Latin America, US and Canada who contact consumer affairs departments and provides a foundation of knowledge on how to do an even more effective job of connecting with consumers,” notes Shapiro.

The Center For Client Retention (TCFCR)/Entrevista) designs and conducts customized customer satisfaction and loyalty measurement systems for Fortune 100 & 500 corporations since 1988.

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