Let’s take a step back in time to 2019 and our Smiling Report.

You will be interested to see the findings by clicking on the links below.  We live in challenging times in 2020 and it will be valuable to see when and where our smiles return first.  Stay safe all.

PRESS RELEASE dd April 21st, 2020

Smile increased, Greeting declined, and Add-on Sales increased from 49% to 68% in 2019 compared to the previous year.

MSPA Europe/Africa has released the 2020 Smiling Report in cooperation with Better Business World Wide and Surfmerchants, the 16th year the report has been published. The Smiling Report consists of data from over 28 million mystery shopping evaluations, collected since 2004, and is compiled from information supplied by Mystery Shopping Providers in Europe, Asia/Pacific, North America and South America. The report analyses customer service data from evaluations conducted across a whole spectrum of industries.
All information is gathered by mystery shoppers from professional mystery shopping companies that are members of MSPA, the trade organization for mystery shopping professionals. The 2020 report provides a summary of almost five million answers to questions focusing on Smile, Greeting and Add-on Sales metrics from 68 countries during 2019. Overall 81% of customers received a smile, 75% were greeted, while 68% received an addon sale suggestion. The aggregated scores were the same for smiling, but decreased by -8 for greeting compared to 2018.

Historically, add-on sales data has always had a lower score than Smile and Greeting (average 2004-2019 is 52%), but 2019 showed a score increase by +19 from 49% to 68%. This is excellent news for our clients, as Add-on Sales can not only pay for the Mystery Shopping program, but also signify higher profitability for the company.

Smiling

• Georgia (99%), Canada, Moldova, Poland and Spain (94%) had the highest Smiling scores, followed by Portugal with 92%. The highest scoring country in South America was Brazil with 89%.
• Lowest Smiling scores were in Serbia (51%), Macau (54%) and Hong Kong (60%). 
• Largest increase compared to last year is in Russia, by +25 to 84%, and Croatia +4 to 80% and Hong Kong +4 to 60%.
• Largest decrease compared to last year has been in Serbia by -17 to 75%, Argentina by -15 to 72%, Slovenia by -13 to 62%.
• As last year, North America is the highest scoring continent, with 92%. The lowest scoring continent was South America at 77%. Asia/Pacific increased their Smiling score by 27 to 79%.
• Highest scoring industry is Automotive with 90%. Transport is lowest with only 48%, a decrease with -5 compared to 2018. Leisure has suffered the largest decrease of the score, down -11 to 78%.

Greeting

• Portugal attained the highest score with 98% Greeting, followed by Austria, Azerbaijan and Switzerland with 96%. The best performing country in South America was Argentina with 94%, in North America, Canada with 89%, and in Asia/Pacific it was India with 85%.
• The lowest Greeting scores were Peru with 57%, and Macau and Luxembourg with 58%.
• Several countries have shown a significant increase in score since 2018, ie. Switzerland by +43 to 96%, Colombia +25 to 76% and Germany +22 to 88%.
• Lithuania decreased their Greeting score with -9 to 80%, USA decreased by -7 to 86% and Belgium -7 to 79%.
• North America was the best performing continent with 87%, and Europe the lowest with 73%. This is the first year since 2008 that Europe has displayed the lowest Greeting score of all continents. Asia/Pacific increased their score by 14 to 80%.
• Government and Transport were the industries with the highest Greeting score at 92%, with Transport showing the greatest year on year increase. Retail was the lowest scoring industry with 70%, a decrease of -12.

Add-on Sales

• 2019 was the year when Add-on Sales really peaked. Add-on Sales increased from an average in 2004-2018 of 51% to 68% in 2019. Spain scored 79%, Australia 76%, followed by Puerto Rico and Russia with 73% and Portugal with 72%. The best scoring country in South America was Brazil with 68%.
• At the very bottom we find Cyprus, this year down to 19%, followed by Greece with 28% and Mexico and Panama at 30%.
• The biggest improvement in Add-on Sales was made by UK, +21 to 61% followed by Peru +20 to 42% and Belgium +13 to 40%.
• The countries that saw their score decline the most (-22) were USA to 56% , The Czech Republic to 36%, and Slovenia decreased by -20 to 40%.
• The highest scoring continent was Europe with 69% and the lowest scoring continent was South America with 54%. North America decreased their score by -16 to 55%.
• The highest score was in the Finance industry with 75%, the lowest score being in the Government sector with 57%, although this was an increase of 48. None of the industries we measure showed decreasing Add-on Sales scores compared to the previous year.

Major interest worldwide

The Smiling Report is used by the business community, media, governments and students all over the world. Access to the data is free of charge, however we would appreciate a contribution to our nominated charity, www.operationsmile.org, so we can achieve more smiles in the world. We are happy to include press clips on the Smiling Report website, and we look forward to receiving your articles and links to publications. All languages are welcome! To see the list of participating mystery shopping providers in each country, or request login details, please visit www.smilingreport.com

Copyright

Anyone can use the data from The Smiling Report in any publication, digital or printed, provided they include a reference that the report is managed by MSPA Europe/Africa, Better Business World Wide and Surfmerchants.

You can access all detailed reports at www.smilingreport.com
For more information about the Smiling Report please contact Bernarda Blazek at bernarda.blazek@newtonresearch.eu or
Veronica Boxberg Karlsson at veronica@betterbusiness.se
To search for mystery shopping providers go to www.mspa-global.org 

MSPA Members - Start preparing now for the Report of 2021 - more details can found here!