Amazon takes the lead position in Forrester’s inaugural Customer Experience Index (CXi) for France. The CXi measures and ranks the customer experience of 38 large brands in France across eight different industries, based on a survey of 2,000 French consumers. Amazon secured the highest overall score in the ranking, a CXi of 81, qualifying the experience the online retailer provides to consumers as “good.” What is striking about the results is that no brand was given an “excellent” CXi score, and French consumers rate their experiences as mostly underwhelming (from “very poor” to “OK”). Retailers earned the highest average industry sector rating, making retail the only industry to score “OK,” followed by hotels and insurers. Bringing up the rear were TV service providers, airlines, and wireless service providers, whose experiences French consumers rated as “poor” to “very poor.”

“With the majority of French online consumers rating the customer experience provided by French brands “poor” or “OK,” the need to apply greater discipline to improve CX quality is evident,” said Joana van den Brink-Quintanilha, senior analyst at Forrester. “Customer experience decision-makers should use the CXi as a galvanizing metric to transform their organizations in the age of the customer.” 

Additional findings from the Customer Experience Index for France include:

  • In total, only five brands — Amazon, E.Leclerc, GMF, Yves Rocher and MAIF — scored 75 or higher, Forrester’s threshold for a customer experience to be considered “good.” 
  • La Banque Postale and Crédit Mutuel received the highest scores out of the banks. AXA Assurance, the only nonmutual insurer on the list, was rated as “very poor.”
  • Even though Free scores “poor” as a TV service provider and “OK” as a wireless service provider, its more than 10 points ahead of its closest competitors in either industry.

For this study, Forrester asked French consumers in the survey to select the companies they interact most with, and to answer three questions about each brand in regard to customer experience: how enjoyable and easy they are to do business with, and how effective they are at meeting customer needs.

For more information, also see this blog post by Joana van den Brink-Quintanilha.