Adidas

Last year, Adidas saw double digit growth in online and offline direct to consumer sales, showing a continued strategic drive towards D2C. Known to refer to ecom as their ‘most important store’, it’s no surprise that the brand has scored highly in the analysis.

With only one delivery and one click & collect option on offer during the mystery shopping, the neuroscientists noted that this could leave the customer feeling powerless due to the lack of control. But a speedy delivery and strong overall brand engagement had an umbrella effect on the lasting customer impression.

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What happened to create a customer response with positive valence?

The returns process offered the customer the option to exchange for another suitable size or colour, rather than the return and the repurchase being separate transactions. This made it easy for the customer, with low cognitive load.

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What happened to create a customer response with negative valence?

There were 11 communications in less than 24 hours (from both the carrier and the retailer, through different channels) which may be considered too many, and may cause unnecessary cognitive load in this short period of time.

Freemans

Freemans is a trusted brand, established over 100 years ago. With history in catalogue commerce, the brand sits under Freemans Grattan Holdings – a group which receives nearly 2 million web visits a year and generates 75% of its transactions online.

The neuroscientists noted that parts of the overall buying journey of our mystery shopping felt somewhat out-of-date compared to some of the other retailers. That said, the overall barometer score is only just below average, with a strong DX score.

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What happened to create a customer response with positive valence?

Contextualised filters during the pre-purchase journey were noted as ‘amazing’. Of all the barometer measures, the delivery phase of the journey was recorded as the strongest.

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What happened to create a customer response with negative valence?

In our mystery shop, we noted that the parcel tracking updates weren’t available for many hours – which may be considered excessive and outside of the ‘safe period’. The safe period is a variable length of time during which a customer does not apply significant unconscious thought to the whereabouts of the parcel.

Gymshark

The mystery shopping experience threw up a few issues, particularly around the delivery experience; resulting in Gymshark scoring below average in the barometer.

That said, founded only ten years ago, the $1 billion empire continues to expand globally. In a market where their brand equity grows every day, and is one of the freshest compared to larger, longer-established brands – the neuroscientists noted that there is plenty of opportunity for the brand to continue to improve customer post-purchase experience. 

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What happened to create a customer response with positive valence?

Too many stimuli can overwhelm the brain and delay decision making – but the stimuli levels on the Gymshark website were adequate, from a shopping point of view.

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What happened to create a customer response with negative valence?

A delivery delay led to the original parcel being lost and a replacement being issued by Gymshark – then, both the original and the replacement were eventually delivered. Synchronised courier tracking and expectations management could be improved.

H&M

There’s no stopping H&M. In 2021, online shopping rose by 30% – and six billion of H&M Group’s 19 billion euro revenue is now carried by ecommerce.

Given the size of the channel, we were pleased to see that the strength of communication and expectation setting was exemplary. Despite some tracking issues, the neuroscientists hailed H&M as the star of post-purchase; noting a number of strengths and some fixes that could have significant positive impact on customer delivery experience.

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What happened to create a customer response with positive valence?

There was little to detract from the dopaminergic effect of buying from H&M. Delivery communications were ‘step-by-step’. Researchers have found that delivery time period estimation is best practice (it stops the brain from starting to simulate and speculate over delivery time) and reduces cognitive discomfort.

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What happened to create a customer response with negative valence?

Communications could have been sent from the H&M app, in the H&M brand more, thus improving the unconscious perception of H&M. Plus, H&M sent a notification to say that the parcel was delivered around 4 days post-delivery, which causes a problem for the customer’s perception of coherence and congruence.

Jack & Jones

JACK & JONES has over 800 stores worldwide, thousands of wholesale partners and a strong online storefront. The neuroscientists had positive feedback about the onsite menu functionality (stating that the performance ‘does not effect cognitive load or stimuli saturation’), as well as noting a good cross-sell engine.

Neuroscientific analysis suggests that there are some post-purchase problems to fix, that could currently be impacting customer delivery experiences – for example, the 7 day delivery window and a gap in tracking that was observed during the mystery shopping experience.

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What happened to create a customer response with positive valence?

Our neuroscientists said was strong on both upsell engine and stimuli saturation (i.e., the clarity of information served to the customer to process).

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What happened to create a customer response with negative valence?

During the secret shopping, a delivery status check found no tracking was available. This is a huge risk and a failure of expectation management, potentially generating an intense negative emotional response, such as anger because you have paid for something that you cannot validate, thus reducing the overall perception of the purchase process.

Louis Vuitton

The most high-end brand in our barometer, the Louis Vuitton experience gave the neuroscientists a lot to analyse. With a strong returns process, but room for improvement in the basket experience – customer expectations are likely to be extremely high when shopping with such a luxury brand. The retailer score was in the lower end of the barometer but had some exemplary points that increased the positive dopaminergic effects.

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What happened to create a customer response with positive valence?

The information on display pre-purchase, such as parcel packaging descriptions, are appropriate for the product selection and, overall, product pages were good.

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What happened to create a customer response with negative valence?

With two delivery options – one click and collect and one 7 day home delivery – the neuroscientists noted that this is slower than Louis Vuitton customers are likely to unconsciously expect.

Missguided

Missguided has more than 4 million active customers aged 18–30, and operates in more than 180 countries worldwide. Following some recent short-term challenges following supply chain disruption, Missguided’s pureplay model sees it as one of the leading brands in the barometer.

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What happened to create a customer response with positive valence?

By ensuring a fast and efficient delivery offering, Missguided reduced the opportunity for negative valence emotions.

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What happened to create a customer response with negative valence?

Delivery update notifications were mostly received late in the evening. Many sleep studies suggest a disruptive effect to our bodies’ natural circadian rhythm, due to suppressed release of melatonin that makes us feel drowsy, from late night exposure to the blue light emitted from electronic backlit screens.

Nike

Nike’s post-purchase performance was just below the average of the 10 retailers in the barometer – but still an impressive score. Even considering some post-purchase performance concerns, our neuroscientists scored the brand high enough to be in the top four highest-scoring brands.

The retailer is the world’s largest supplier of athletic shoes and apparel and, in recent years, has severed ties with many high-profile third party sellers (such as Urban Outfitters and Macy’s) in a strategic move to focus on D2C channels. A model which is reflected in a customer-centric experience.

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What happened to create a customer response with positive valence?

The amount of information about the delivery process is detailed enough to avoid any kind of suspicion (any reason not to trust the retailer).

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What happened to create a customer response with negative valence?

An option to view the estimated delivery time on the product page listing could help the customer’s unconscious decision to add to basket. Setting helpful expectations around delivery as early as possible.

TK Maxx

Traditionally focussing more on bricks and mortar experiences, the neuroscientists found TK Maxx to be above the barometer average.

The post-purchase experience was one of the most complete in the analysis and, despite some delivery delays, communications and resolution was called out as areas in which customer response is likely to be positive due to the reduced cognitive load.

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What happened to create a customer response with positive valence?

Information about the parcel delivery was one of the most complete in the analysis – including updates provided even before the carrier received the parcel from the retailer. The neuroscientists also noted that delivery information was integrated well into the retailer site.

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What happened to create a customer response with negative valence?

Somewhat out of the ordinary for the modern day returns experience, our mystery shop found that the parcel required payment for return (despite contradictory information on the back of the dispatch note suggesting that ‘return by post only’ items are free). This may not be expected unconsciously, and could cause upset (high activation negative valence – a strong negative emotional response).

Very

The Very Group boasts 4.8 million active customers, with 49 million items delivered annually. Known for being a retailer with a customer-first obsession, there are a number of opportunities to see Very’s customer delivery experience become even more powerful.

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What happened to create a customer response with positive valence?

There were a number of areas called out as ‘amazing’ – including a customer service interaction during the mystery shopping experience that had a polite and timely resolution. The Very Group claims around 2.2 million daily website visits, and 268,000 customer queries answered by chatbots each month.

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What happened to create a customer response with negative valence?

During the mystery shop, the Very website didn’t allow the return initially and required the shopper to contact customer services. However this is not as easy as the customer may consciously expect, given the expectations set by the banner advertising free returns and a ‘no hassle, no fuss’ process. This is an area for improvement, as fully automated returns processes via the website can avoid disappointment i.e. a negative emotional response to a questioned or failed promise.

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