The 2022 Tendances de la Relation Client

Accustomed to gaining insight into emerging consumption and customer relationship practices and trends, Thierry Spencer chose a particularly fitting location for his Tendances 2022: the first floor of the Eiffel Tower.

As was the case with the previous editions (which can be found on the page dedicated to the Tendances de la Relation Client), we once again had the pleasure to be a partner of the event.

You can as each year discover the event report with the unveiling on the six major trends of 2022.

The first trend makes a surprising statement: customers have a quite ambivalent relation with certifications and labels. While a large proportion of them are calling for clearer and more detailed information on the products, few can spontaneously name the existing labels.

Customers are also becoming more careful and aware of companies commitments, even more so since the beginning of the health crisis. A trend which resonates particularly well with ERDIL activity and ERDIL’s commitment.

Delivery remains a key point in the customer journey. As delivery times in big cities get shorter and shorter, quick commerce has now become the holy grail for a lot of companies specialising in this activity.

This trend results from a phenomenon which, while not new, becomes more prevalent with each passing year and which, for reasons of necessity, has exploded since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic: e-commerce.

As a direct consequence of this trend, customers, who have got more accustomed with e-commerce, tend to become scarce at points of sale. Despite this, customers remain particularly attached to the advice provided by professionals in shops. The challenge for brands involves (re)inventing the shopping experience to satisfy both online and in-store shoppers.

Conséquence directe de cette tendance : le client devenu plus familier avec l’e-commerce se fait de plus en plus rare sur le lieu de vente. Malgré cela, les consommateurs restent particulièrement attachés aux conseils des professionnels en magasin. L’enjeu est donc pour les marques de (ré)inventer l’expérience proposée pour contenter acheteurs en ligne et en point de vente.

Another trend that has developed widely in recent years is the collection and the display of customer reviews. They can now be found on all platforms, ranging from products sheets to marketplaces, not to forget search engines. Their impact on customers’ willingness or unwillingness to buy is real and companies have thus begun directly integrating them into their product lifecycles.

Gaëtan Maillet, Customer and Collaborator Project Manager, had aptly mentioned during our latest Panel Discussion the willingness of Decathlon to withdraw from sale some products whose customer reviews were very negative, in order to have them improved or redesigned.

Despite all efforts provided by brands to listen to customers, Voice of the Customer remains a work in progress for many companies. We obviously encourage brands to engage in this area. If you are still undecided, we invite you to discover the benefits of automatic feedback analysis and the advantages of our support.

While customers are ever-increasingly present on digital platforms (cf. 3rd Trend: customers will be scarce), they are also increasingly using marketplaces. These platforms have grown in number and a lot of major retailers now have their own marketplaces.

This trend thus brings into play a certain form of reintermediation in the relation between customers and brands.

A virtual reality headset could help you apprehend this last trend! Already widespread in video games, virtual universes are quickly growing on other platforms as demonstrated by Facebook’s latest announcements regarding Meta and the “Metaverse”.

Brands have already started stepping into these spaces and there is no doubt whether their presence and product placements within these universes are going to increase quickly…