Product & Process Benchmarking

Objective

The client wanted to benchmark following parameters against its competition:

• Product quality and packaging quality
• End-to-end processes from order placement to product return & refund
• Logistics partner evaluation and delivery executive experience
• Customer care responsiveness and problem resolution mechanism
• Consumer expectations on service standards versus actual experience

Approach

• Product/service selection - Similar products/services were selected across competition to avoid any bias in final outcome.
• Auditor selection - Auditors were selected across age-groups, income segments and geographies in the target cities.
• Audit to auditor ratio - Based on past experience, an appropriate audit to auditor ratio was maintained to avoid auditor fatigue.
• Data collection & quality check - Adequate systems were established to enable real-time data collection and cleaning.
• Data analysis & reporting - It involved critical evaluation of practices followed at other companies, and identification of benchmarks that could inspire superior performance. The analysis was done at various levels like category, city-tier and order fulfilment.

Outcome

The insights from the study helped the clients on the following aspects:

• Identified positives and pain points/focus areas across product and process parameters
• Identified market leader across product and process parameters based on benchmarks established
• Established/modified processes for activities where there was no process