50+ Customer Retention Statistics 2023 (Data and Trends) (2024)

Report Highlights

• Customer Retention has a huge impact on ROI – 5% increase in CR results in 25 – 29% increase in revenue.
• Retaining existing customers has been shown to increase profitability by 25% to an astounding 95%.
• About half of a company’s revenue is from approximately 8% of their most loyal consumers.
• For some companies, at least 70% of their value is from their high-value customers.
• The industry of customer loyalty management is valued at $4 billion, worldwide, as of March 2022.
• Worldwide, companies spend $75 billion per year on loyalty management systems.
• The industries with the highest customer retention rate are Media and Professional Services, each with 84% average customer retention rate.
• The Hospitality, Restaurants, and Travel industry has the lowest customer retention, retaining only 55% their customers.

Why is Customer Retention Important?

Loyal, existing customers tend to buy more frequently and spend more overall than new customers. They also tend to be happy customers who will also refer people by word of mouth and/or social media.

• Customer retention greatly affects return on investment, or ROI, with a 5% increase in CR resulting in 25 – 29% increase in revenue.
• Retaining existing customers can increase profitability by even more, as much 25% to a whopping 95%.
• It costs much less to retain a customer than to gain a new one – 1/6th to 1/7th the cost.
• Other studies show it can cost 5 to 25 times more to acquire a new customer than to retain an existing one.
• Repeat customers have been measured to spend an average of 67% more than new customers.
• It’s easy to see why 82% of companies say that retaining a customer is less expensive than acquiring a new one.
• Retention is mostly successful, with companies stating that 65% – 75% of their business comes from retained customers.

Customer Retention Loyalty Program Statistics

• Loyalty programs have been shown to cause 54% of a company’s customer base to increase spending with that company.
• Almost half of a company’s revenue can be attributed to approximately 8% of their most loyal consumers.
• For some industries, 70% or more of a company’s value is from their high-value consumers.
• In March, 2021, the average U.S. consumer was part of 16.7 loyalty programs, though only actively utilized 7.4 of them.
• Since 2016, there was an average increase of belonging to 3.3 more loyalty programs, but using only 0.7 more.
• In the past 5 years, consumers joining loyalty programs increased by 24.6%, but utilization of loyalty programs only increased 10.4%.
• 2021 was essentially the first time in at least 6 years that utilization of loyalty programs increased, on average.
• There was a temporary dip in using loyalty programs in 2018, but utilization returned to previous levels the following year.
• Personalized gamification can increase a company’s growth by 6 – 10%.
• The 15% of business that most successfully implement personalization are projected to benefit by $800 billion within 5 years.

Customer Personalization and Loyalty Examples

Loyalty programs, and specifically, truly personalized loyalty programs have been shown to greatly increase customer retention.

• Since 2014, Starbucks has been sending games through its loyalty program.
• Starbucks started customizing the games according to collected data in 2016.
• The personalized games are credited with increasing the results of Starbuck’s marketing campaign by 300%.
• It is also credited with increasing email redemptions 200%.
• Additionally, there was a 300% increase of incremental spending by the customers who redeemed offers.
• In a recent survey of over 50 companies, over half said they have at least 25 employees just for personalization.
• The same survey revealed that these companies are also spending at least $5 million on personalization campaigns.
• Just 15% of companies are labeled “personalization leaders.”
• Companies cite several challenges to achieving personalization, including dedicated personnel (74%), and inadequate cross-functional coordination (61%).
• They also cite insufficient creative processes (57%), not enough knowledge/talent (54%), and company culture not agreeable to innovation (52%)
• Nearly 60% of companies agreed that they have trouble measuring personalization campaigns.

How do you Measure Customer Retention?

There is actually a formula for calculating a company’s customer retention rate. First, you need to determine the period that you will be evaluating, whether that is a certain month, year, etc.

• The formula is: [(Customers at End of Period – Customers Gained During Period)/Customers at Beginning of Period] x 100.
• For example, if you had 100 customers at the end of a period, gained 40 during, with 80 initially, your Customer Retention was 75%.
• The way to calculate this is: [(100-40)/80] x 100 = 75% retention rate.

Average Customer Retention Statistics by Industry

The following are the average customer retention rates for these industries, published in 2022 based on worldwide surveys in 2018. It’s helpful to see how one company compares to the average in its field.

• The customer loyalty management industry, worldwide, is valued at $4 billion as of March 2022.
• It is expected to increase 4.5-fold (or more) to at least $18 billion by the end of 2028.
• Companies spend $75 billion per year on loyalty management systems, worldwide.
• Almost half (45%) of businesses agreed that it is important to personalize loyalty offers to their customers.
• The industries with the highest customer retention rate are Media and Professional Services, each with 84% average customer retention rate.
• They are closely followed by Automotive and Transportation, and the Insurance industry, which each claim 83% customer retention.
• IT services has high customer retention, as well, with 81% retention, and Construction and Engineering has 80%.
• The industry with the lowest customer retention on the list is Hospitality, Restaurants, and Travel, with only 55% retention.
• The next lowest was Retail, which had only 63% customer retention.
• Consumer Services and Manufacturing were tied for 3rd lowest customer retention with a 67% retention rate.

Customer Retention Statistics by Industry (Table)

Source: See Reference 4. For illustration purposes only.

Churn Rate Statistics by Industry

The churn rate, also known as attrition rate, is the rate at which customers stop using a service. It is somewhat of an inverse customer retention statistic, mostly used on subscription-based services.

• Cable and Financial/credit services had the highest churn rates in 2020, at 25% each.
• General retail was a close 2nd, with 24% churn, followed by Online Retail with 22% churn.
• Big Box Electronics had some of the lower churn rates measured, with only 11%.
• Travel was also relatively low with an 18% churn rate.

Churn Rate Statistics by Industry (Table)

Source: See Reference 6. For illustration purposes only.

More Customer Retention Statistics

• Three-fourths (75%) of customers state that they prefer businesses that offer rewards.
• More than half (56%) of consumers offer their loyalty to companies that “get them.”
• Perhaps this is why 58% of companies utilize strategies for personalization in order to attempt to increase customer retention.
• Email is still one marketing tactic used by 80% of business to try to retain customers.
• Organic search is ranked 2nd as a tactic for retaining customers.
• In 3rd spot for maintaining customers is paid search.
• Finally, social media ranks 4th for businesses as a method for retaining customers.
• During the COVID-19 pandemic, 75% of consumers revealed that they altered their shopping habits and changed to different brands.

References

1. Bain & Company, Inc.
2. American Express
3. Statista Loyalty Programs
4. Statista Customer Retention Rates by Industry
5. Small Biz Genius
6. Statista Churn Rates by Industry, 2020
7. Segment Customer Data Platform Report 2022
8. Emarsys
9. Formation
10. Business.com, Returning Customers
11. BCG