Overall customer satisfaction with providers up 5% versus last year, ISG Star of Excellence™ CX Insights Report finds

Enterprise buyers of technology and business services are more satisfied with their providers than they were last year, even as they place greater emphasis on innovation and service execution, according to a new report from Information Services Group (ISG) (Nasdaq: III), a leading global technology research and advisory firm.

The latest ISG Star of Excellence™ CX Insights Report, a quarterly review that sheds light on what enterprise buyers think about their service and solution providers, shows overall satisfaction with providers in the second quarter, as measured by average enterprise CX score, increased 5 percent, to a score of 74 (on a scale of 1-100), versus the prior year. Satisfaction scores were up in all six dimensions measured by ISG, with particularly strong increases for “Governance and Compliance” and “Collaboration and Transparency”, both up 7 percent versus the prior year. Compared with the first quarter, the overall CX score was up 13 percent sequentially.

Importance ratings on “Innovation and Thought Leadership” and “Execution and Delivery” saw the biggest jumps in the second quarter versus the prior year, increasing 11 percent and 10 percent, respectively. Execution and Delivery, with an importance score of 81 was the highest-ranked dimension for enterprises.

“Enterprises clearly expect more innovation from their providers to transform their businesses and drive future results, especially in a time of economic uncertainty,” said Heiko Henkes, ISG director and principal analyst in charge of the study. “Likewise, they expect better execution and delivery, to get more bang for their buck, so to speak.”

Henkes said improving satisfaction scores, versus last year and the prior quarter, reflect a budding optimism among enterprises about the future of their partnerships with providers.

“After hitting a low point in the first quarter, reflecting the depths of enterprise uncertainty with the global economy, satisfaction scores have rebounded in the second quarter,” Henkes said. “Viewed through the lens of cost optimization, enterprises were expecting a great deal from their providers at the beginning of the year. Now they realize they are in the same economic boat and are turning more optimistic about what providers can do for them in the future, with advances in automation on the horizon and excitement over generative AI.”

The ISG report noted enterprise customers were particularly satisfied with their providers’ ability to maintain effective cybersecurity measures (for the Governance and Compliance dimension) and define project milestones and efficiently execute handoffs between teams (for the Collaboration and Transparency dimension).

In addition to overall CX scores, the second-quarter report focuses on CX scores by technology domain, following on from the first-quarter report, which examined CX scores by industry. Future reports will spotlight CX scores by geographic region (third quarter) and wrap up the year with an annual analysis (fourth quarter).

CX Scores by Technology Domain

Enterprises were most satisfied with providers of enterprise service management (ESM), with a CX score of 82; cybersecurity services, with a CX score of 81, and contact center – customer experience services, with a CX score of 79.

In the IT outsourcing (ITO) sector, cybersecurity (up 15 percent), ESM (up 11 percent) and software-defined networking (up 9 percent) saw greatest year-over-year improvements in CX scores, the ISG research found. In the business process outsourcing (BPO) sector, the biggest CX gainers were finance and accounting (FAO) services, up 11 percent, and contact center services, up 7 percent.

Intelligent automation and data analytics, supply chain services, and cloud-native technology services (including containers and serverless architecture) received the lowest satisfaction scores from enterprise customers. The report recommends providers of these services improve resource allocation and cost efficiency while co-innovating with their customers, and in the case of cloud-native technology, improve engagement with the open-source community.

The report also examines satisfaction with ITO and BPO services by region, key industries and executive roles.

About ISG Star of Excellence™ CX Insights Research

CX scores reported in the ISG Star of Excellence™ CX Insights Report represent the weighted average of client satisfaction scores and importance scores across six dimensions: Execution and Delivery, Governance and Compliance, Collaboration and Transparency, Innovation and Thought Leadership, People and Cultural Fit, and Business Continuity and Flexibility.

Through ISG’s continuous Voice of the Customer survey research, customers are asked to rate the importance of each of the six dimensions and then rate their service provider/vendor on each, on a scale of 1-100. CX scores are also generated across industries, regions and technology domains and for each service provider/vendor.

ISG Star of Excellence™ CX Insights scores are an integral part of the provider assessments offered by ISG Provider Lens™ research, the only service provider evaluation of its kind to combine empirical, data-driven research and market analysis with the real-world experience and observations of ISG's global advisory team.

The 2Q 2023 ISG Star of Excellence™ CX Insights Report is available as a free download from this webpage, with more detailed findings, including by provider, available by contacting ISG.

Further insights on the first half of 2023 can be found in the recent ISG Star of Excellence™ CX Insights webinar here.

Enterprises who wish to participate in the ISG Voice of the Customer survey research can begin the process by visiting this website. Providers also can nominate their customers to participate.

About ISG

ISG (Information Services Group) (Nasdaq: III) is a leading global technology research and advisory firm. A trusted business partner to more than 900 clients, including more than 75 of the world’s top 100 enterprises, ISG is committed to helping corporations, public sector organizations, and service and technology providers achieve operational excellence and faster growth. The firm specializes in digital transformation services, including automation, cloud and data analytics; sourcing advisory; managed governance and risk services; network carrier services; strategy and operations design; change management; market intelligence and technology research and analysis. Founded in 2006, and based in Stamford, Conn., ISG employs more than 1,600 digital-ready professionals operating in more than 20 countries—a global team known for its innovative thinking, market influence, deep industry and technology expertise, and world-class research and analytical capabilities based on the industry’s most comprehensive marketplace data. For more information, visit www.isg-one.com.

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