The Armada/Mastio Distributor Customer Value Study – 1st Edition 2023
The Armada/Mastio team will conduct the 1st Annual Customer Value Analysis (CVA) Group Study for the Distributor community in 2023. Other group CVA studies conducted by Mastio are entering their 18th consecutive year.
The Armada/Mastio Study Will Answer the Following Questions:
1. How do customers make their distributor purchase decisions? What factors are the most critical drivers of customers’ perceptions of overall value and loyalty?
2. What are the factors that lead to customer defection? What factors result in better retention – and a greater share of wallet?
3. How do customers perceive your overall value and loyalty relative to key competitors? How competitive is your position in the marketplace?
4. How do customers perceive your performance on key buying factors? What do customers perceive as strengths and weaknesses relative to key competitors?
5. How large a role does price play in the purchasing decision? What performance factors will allow a distributor to charge a premium?
6. Which competitors are the most vulnerable and strongest in their ability to gain and retain customers?
How it Works:
Telephone interviews will be conducted with key decision-makers at 100’s of companies that work with distributors across North America. Respondents (users of distributors) will provide feedback on the performance of Distributors on these key decision factors:
- Availability of products.
- Competitive pricing.
- Consistent on-time delivery.
- Customer service representatives communicate effectively.
- Customer service representatives respond to my needs promptly.
- Ease of use of distributor’s website.
- Innovative technology to improve buying process.
- Proactive communication in the event of a delivery delay.
- Product quality.
- Robustness of distributor’s product offering.
- Sales representative understands the distribution market.
- Sales representatives are problem solvers.
- Sales representatives respond in a timely manner.
- Shipping costs.
- The distributor is committed to my business long-term.
- The distributor is easy to do business with.
- The distributor is honest and trustworthy.
- Overall performance rating independent of price.
- How likely would you be to recommend this company to a colleague?
The NPS (Net Promoter Score) is also provided for each company and is one of the most used performance measurement tools among the world’s largest companies.
Multiple Voice of the Customer (VOC) questions will also be asked of each respondent and each distributor will have the ability to add custom questions.
In short, the study will identify areas where improvements in performance (and corresponding sales and marketing actions) can more successfully lead customers to choose a specific Distributor more often than its competitors, regardless of size.
What is Involved for Each Distributor?
The time required to participate in the study is minimal. Each subscriber will work with the Armada/Mastio team in the submission of customers (lists held in confidence) to be contacted for the Customer Value Study.
If a customer would like to add custom questions, the Armada/Mastio team will work independently with them to get those questions added to that distributor’s questionnaire. Most of those questions can be added via a quick conversation (by phone, digital meeting, or e-mail) between the distributor and Armada/Mastio.
The Armada/Mastio team will communicate with each subscriber during the data collection process to keep them updated on our progress. Once the study is completed, Mastio will provide deliverables, including a research book, Excel spreadsheets, and an Executive Overview Slide Deck. The Armada/Mastio team will assist in socializing the results to broader teams at each subscriber, explaining the research, implications, opportunities, and items to work on.
In other group studies, Mastio has awarded national and regional recognition awards to firms that excel in performance. We intend to use a similar award process for the first distributor study and subsequent ones in following years.
The professional fee is scaled based on the size of the distributor (typically due to the number of regions and size of the customer base). The professional fee for the smallest distributors will be approximately $6,500, while the largest distributors with multiple regions and large and diverse customer bases could be in the $40k-$50k range.
Why a Group Study Format?
A group study spreads the cost of completing the research across a group of subscribers, helping to make the study affordable for distributors of all sizes. Customers are asked which distributors they use, and they evaluate each of those companies on 20 unique attributes, plus a series of independent questions. Those scores are evaluated across the hundreds of live interviews that will be conducted during the study and individual results are then prepared for each distributor participant in the study.
For more information, please contact:
Keith Prather
Armada Corporate Intelligence
kprather@armadaci.com
Kevin Huntsman
Mastio & Company
khuntsman@mastio.com
Transportation
Energy
Manufacturing
Financial Services
Consumer Goods
