Bulgaria ranked number four for Add-on sales
For the 11th consecutive year, Better Business Worldwide collected data from mystery shopping visits, conducted in Africa, Asia, Europe, North and South America. The data was collected by mystery shopping providers, members of the MSPA (Mystery Shopping Providers Association). The companies prepare a report, which tracks the level of service in different industries. It is the seventh year since Bulgaria and the Bulgarian company Client X have taken part in the Smiling report.
The 2014 report is based on over 1.7 million visits, conducted in 69 countries. The data compares three criteria: “Smile”, “Greeting” and “Offer of additional purchase”. The number of visits used in the calculation of the results is different and depends mostly on the scale of the market in question. “Client X” participates in the project with over 8 000 personal visits and telephone calls for 2014.
The data shows that 87% of the mystery shoppers were greeted, in 80% of the cases the greeting was accompanied with a smile. A little more than half of the shoppers (52%) were offered an additional product.
The result for the “Greeting” criteria hasn’t changed much since last year, but the “Smile” and “Offering an additional purchase” show decline. The results differ depending on continent, country and industry.
Smiles
Iceland is the best performing country with 97%, closely followed by Greece and Puerto Rico with 93% and Lithuania with 92%. At the bottom, we find Slovenia (46%), South Korea (47%), Hong Kong (48%), Macao (55%) and Croatia (56%). China has the most significant increase – from 58% in 2013 to 86% in 2014. What is our position? In Bulgaria 69% of the employees smiled to our mystery shoppers in 2014. The worldwide average is 80%. In Europe we rank 24th for this criteria.
The most smiling continent is North America with 84%, followed by South America with 83% and Europe – 82%. Africa has the lowest results – 69%, while in Asia the percentage is 75%.
The comparison between industries shows that the highest result is for Cosmetics and Health and the Automotive industry – 86%, followed by the Financial industry – 84%. The employees in the Transport industry smile the least. In Bulgaria, the most smiling employees are in the Financial industry (83% of them greeted the clients with a smile).
Greeting
Six Latin American countries report maximum result – Costa Rica, Guadeloupe, Guatemala, Martinique, Paraguay, and Venezuela. 5 more countries from the same region achieve 99%. Which European countries rank first? Slovakia has 99%, followed by Ireland with 98%. The lowest score worldwide is Macao, barely 53%.
Overall between continents, South America is number 1 on the “Greeting” criteria with 94%, while Asia is last with 72%. The Health and Cosmetics industry has the highest success rate for greetings – 95%, followed by the Hospitality industry with 94%. The Transport industry has the lowest result – 55%.
84% of the mystery shoppers in Bulgaria were greeted, which puts us 21st in Europe. The lowest score on the continent has Netherlands – 72%.
In Bulgaria the industry with the highest score is once again Finance (88%), followed by Retail – (82%) and the Automotive industry (79%).
Add-on sales
The results achieved in the “Add-on sales” criteria have always been the weakest, compared to the “Greeting” and “Smile”. Add-on sales is dominated by South American countries at the top of the list (Honduras - 97% and Guatemala – 91%). The lowest score was found in Japan (22%), Cyprus (26%) and Croatia (27%). More than 50% of all countries scored less than 50% on add-on sales.
One of the main requirements for the employees in every industry is to offer additional products to their customers. This requirement is part of their training. According to the data from Smiling Report 2014, Bulgaria ranks at the 14th place globally and is 5th in Europe with 58%, which is 8 points higher than the average results of all countries. The only European countries with a better result are Sweden (60%), Iceland and Lithuania (59%). The fifth place is for Romania with 55%.
In Bulgaria, the employees in the Retail industry offer additional products to the clients most often (58%), followed closely by the financial institutions (57%).
Does the quality of service we get improve? Yes, after a sharp decline in 2009-2010, worldwide, there is a slight but stable tendency of improvement of the results for the tested criteria. Therefore, next year we hope to see more smiles; however we must work for them.