2024 UserTesting Retail Benchmark Report

Executive summary

In today’s competitive retail landscape, delivering exceptional customer experiences is crucial. And in digital, those deliveries have become increasingly costly. The cost of a visit was up 12.4% year-over-year (per Contentsquare's Retail Digital Experience Benchmark), an expensive byproduct of increasing spend to attract shoppers—primarily via Google and Meta—coupled with a decline in visits.

Add to that the AI-fueled noise crowding organic search and the spiking costs in emerging social channels, and we see retailers refocusing on ensuring the customers they already have keep coming back.

Traditional retention strategies like loyalty programs, promotions, and owned marketing are tried and true. But they've also been optimized extensively, leading retail executives to look for other opportunities to drive customer loyalty.

It's no longer enough to focus on just one aspect of the shopping experience—conversion rates and shopping cart size on their own won't tell retail leaders what they need to know: what their customers think about the entire shopping experience.

The quality of a digital shopping experience needs to be viewed through the lens of the customer, from the first search to post-purchase customer support. Traditional metrics like NPS or CSAT only paint part of the customer experience picture. 

To stay competitive, leading retailers need to gain a view of the entire shopper journey, along with a holistic understanding of the shopper's perception of their visit. QXscore®, UserTesting's proprietary experience measure, considers the true shopping reality from the activities across the journey, including any obstacles they encountered, through their attitude about the visit, and whether they'd come back.

Drawn from the actions and reactions of 2,750 shoppers visiting the top 25 US retailers, this year’s UserTesting Retail Benchmark quantifies the quality of experience, identifying the drivers of shopping success and challenges and how the experience helps determine whether a shopper returns.

Key findings

1. Superstores are lead QXscorers. Amazon, Target, and Walmart take the top three spots in this year’s Retail Benchmark Report.
2. Despite most shoppers completing their journey, 41% of shoppers faced an obstacle.
3. Shoppers facing 2 or more obstacles during their journey are 34% less likely to return.
4. QXscore leaders are bringing back 90% of their shoppers, compared with only 71% for the underperforming retailers
5. Improving QXscores can deliver 4.4% more traffic and $226M in combined annual revenue across 6 lower-scoring QXscore retailers

The shopper journey

We asked each shopper to complete 4 tasks

1. Search or browse for a product
2. Find a gift
3. Find an item that can be delivered or picked up ASAP
4. Checkout

Remote video URL

Together, these tasks comprise a composite of the shopper's journey. Their activity teaches us a lot about that journey and is made actionable with QXscore benchmarking.

Consumer behavior insights

Shoppers are fluent in ecommerce

We see that today's shoppers are ecommerce fluent. Across age groups and devices, these shoppers are clearly capable of shopping. We're all living in the digital commerce era.

Too many shoppers encounter obstacles

However, the shopper journey is by no means without its challenges. Despite most shoppers completing their journey, 41% of shoppers faced an obstacle. Those obstacles take many forms, but a few issues consistently bother shoppers.

And some shoppers are seeing far too many obstacles standing in the way of their shopping journey. 1 out of every 5 shoppers faces 2 or more obstacles during their journey.

Obstacles make shoppers less likely to return

And these obstacles are standing in the way of an important result—a returning visit.

When there are 2 or more obstacles, the potential for repeat visits—and revenue—fades.

And, it should come as no surprise that those shoppers who face more obstacles are more dissatisfied with their experience and not likely to recommend the site to others. In NPS terms, they're likely to be detractors.

QXscore analysis

While obstacles play a role in the experience, we turn to QXscore to see a full view of how retailers are serving their shoppers.

The QXscore leaders are the world-class retailers piling up shopper visits and continuing to be the destinations of choice. Amazon, Target, and Walmart have earned a reputation for best in-class on-site experience and take the top three spots in this year’s Retail Benchmark.

Most importantly, though, retailers with the strongest QXscores are proving to be the best at encouraging repeat visits. 90% of shoppers visiting the top QXscoring retailers report that they're likely to come back.

And the top performers have something in common: shoppers encounter few obstacles during their shopper journey (.56 obstacles per journey) on these sites.

Meanwhile, the lowest QXscorers are forcing shoppers to struggle with twice as many obstacles per journey, 1.2. And shoppers are penalizing them. Only 70% of their shoppers express their likelihood to return to these lower-performing sites.

Across all retailers, shoppers who face 2 or more obstacles are 34% less likely (29 percentage points) to return.

Shoppers are dropping another heavy hint about their quality of experience–the amount of effort it takes to navigate the journey. Shoppers who are likely to return complete their journeys in 9 fewer clicks than those who are neutral or unlikely to return.

Improving retail performance

With retention trading at an all-time high, and the digital experience providing an advantage to drive repeat visits, QXscore is a key indicator for retailers to impact. The study's analysis found that a single-point increase in QXscore can increase traffic by .42%. 

The opportunity is significant when projected onto the top retailers, specifically those lower-performers. Across the lowest-performing retailers, drawing their QXscores level with the QX leaders can deliver an average traffic windfall of 4.4%.

And driving additional traffic translates to increased revenue. Factoring each retailer's potential traffic gain with revenue per visit, the opportunity is significant, 7 and 8-figure revenue increases that add up to boost the top line.

QXscore shows that even the experiences previously thought to be intangible can be measured by real, tangible results.

Methodology and analysis

Methodology

Participants were asked to complete 4 navigation tasks and respond to survey questions. 

1. Search or browse for a product

2. Find a gift

3. Find an item that can be delivered or picked up ASAP

4. Checkout

The data for this report was collected between May 7-12, 2024, using UserTesting's platform, and employing mixed methods to evaluate the shopping experience at the top 25 US retailers. A total of 2,750 shoppers participated, each tasked with completing four navigation tasks and responding to survey questions. For each retailer, 55 participants used desktop devices, while another 55 used mobile devices, totaling 110 participants per retailer. Screen recordings and think-aloud videos captured key moments and obstacles, allowing for the assessment of shopper attitudes and the likelihood of return. This comprehensive analysis, utilizing UserTesting's QXscore, provides valuable insights into retail performance by highlighting both quantitative and qualitative aspects of the shopping journey.

Analysis

The study analyzes the relationship between QXscore and shopper retention, with data sourced from SEMrush, Grips Intelligence, Contentsquare’s Retail Digital Experience Benchmark, and the Salesforce Shopping Index. Projections are annualized based on Q1 2024 data, with traffic and revenue implications carefully calculated.