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Great service is where your profit lies

According to SDL's study of of consumers' Christmas shopping preferences and behaviours, 53% of UK shoppers (and 60% of consumers globally) are willing to pay a premium for a better customer experience.

With Christmas spending in the UK predicted to exceed £40 billion in 2013 (reaching that level for the first time ever) it is undoubtedly important for organisations to understand these trends and deliver a consistently compelling and engaging customer experience, the company warned.

The study surveyed over 4,000 consumers globally, including 2,000 from the UK and 1,000 each from the USA and Australia. Among the study's key findings:

• Customer experience is more important than price
  More than half of UK shoppers (53%) are willing to pay more for a product if the brand delivers a positive customer experience, suggesting that businesses which compromise on customer experience in favour of lower prices are adopting the wrong strategy. For consumers in the US, this figure increases to nearly three-quarters (73%).
• Workplace shopping
  Nearly one in three (29%) respondents globally admit to shopping for Christmas gifts online while they should be working. This figure is slightly higher in the US (31%) than in the UK (28%) and Australia (27%); overall it is clear that online Christmas shopping could be significantly impacting business productivity.
• Showrooming remains relevant
  More than half of UK respondents say they are researching products they want to buy directly in-store (55%). This remains a more common research option than the use of online tools such as retailer websites (49%) and other ecommerce sites (30%).
• Product research diversifies, but social lags behind
  Despite the growing popularity of social channels, less than 5% of respondents learn about products on Facebook and Google+ and less than 2% on Pinterest and Twitter.
• Mobile is right for research, but purchases stagnate
  While mobile commerce technology continues to evolve, the majority of consumers in the UK (68%), US (64%), and Australia (67%) say they will not use a tablet or smartphone more this year to purchase gifts. Mobile is a valuable research tool, however, with 45% of all respondents using mobile devices to conduct research before purchasing.
• Bricks-and-mortar gain ground
  Despite the growth in online sales volumes, the study found that consumer preferences toward traditional bricks and mortar stores increased in 2013. In the UK, the proportion of those who prefer shopping in traditional stores increased from 43% to 45%.
• Key dates over-hyped
  15% of UK shoppers wait until after Bonfire Night (5th November) to begin their Christmas shopping; and 2% do not start until Christmas Eve (24th December). However, key shopping dates such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday matter less to consumers than they do for retailers, with the vast majority of shoppers globally saying that they do not plan their spending around specific dates (63% in the UK and over 80% in the US).

"The holiday shopping season is a critical time for brands to provide a positive customer experience," concluded Mark Lancaster, CEO of SDL. "This study shows that consumers' preferences and behaviours change considerably from year to year, and from country to country. Organisations that are able to consistently deliver compelling and engaging experiences, across media and geographies, will be the most successful."

Have you seen The Marketing Factbook?

The Marketing Factbook will help you up your marketing game, walking you through the techniques, metrics, reporting, analysis, marketing models, technologies, tools and innovations you need for a hgih-profit, high-rentention marketing strategy.

This comprehensive marketing guide has 400+ packed pages of marketing strategy, trends, best practices, do's and don'ts, practical know-how, facts and figures, and tons of ideas to boost sales revenue, market share, ROI, and profits. It's the report no marketer can afford to be without.

Find out the best ways to gather, analyse, and act on customer data to increase profitability, build your brand, empower your customers, beat the competition, reduce churn, and increase customer profitability.

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Get the hard facts, forecasts and trends identified by our experts from the global Marketing Factbook's vast database of market data, studies, research and white papers, and gain an invaluable library of ideas and practical support you can call upon at will.

With The Marketing Factbook at your side, you'll have a true goldmine of easily adaptable and up-to-date strategies, walk-throughs, trends, research and market data, plus all the supporting arguments you need to build a solid, profitable marketing strategy: All the know-how, strategies and ideas you need to get your own Marketing Playbook right, first time.

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