Trust and speed are what APAC consumers want from brands: SAP Hybris

More than 83 percent of consumers surveyed in Asia-Pacific said they are willing to share at least some form of personal information with brands, provided that the brands are open with them on how the data will be used. The flip side is that 78 percent of the consumers said they will not buy from the brand again once their trust is broken.

The findings released in conjunction with World Consumer Rights Day on Wednesday are based on a survey of 7,000 consumers in the region by SAP Hybris. 

According to the survey, the APAC consumers are most comfortable with sharing email addresses (58 percent), followed by shopping history and preference (49 percent) and mobile numbers (36 percent). Their main concerns when sharing data with brands are whether their interest will be protected when their data is used (67 percent), transparency (52 percent) and customer privacy in criminal investigation (47 percent). Japanese consumers are the most cautious with only 52 percent of those surveyed said they will share their data with brands.

Meanwhile, the need for speed in customer service is acute in the region with one in two consumers expecting brands to respond within three hours. Consumers from India, China and Singapore are found to be the most demanding. Forty-eight percent of consumers in India and China expect brands to answer their queries within the hour while 81 percent of Singaporean consumers said they will abandon the brand if its customer service is unresponsive. Singapore is the only market which ranked customer service over the use of data without knowledge. 

"With customer expectations higher than ever due with digitisation, the pressure is on for marketers to keep up with tech-savvy, always-on consumers—or risk getting trampled by the competition,” said Nicholas Kontopoulos, global vice president of Fast Growth Markets Marketing at SAP Hybris.

In addition to speed and transparency, consumers in the region also expect personalised customer experience in the form of "surprises" from brands (58 percent). For comparison within the region, consumers from Singapore, China and Japan appreciate services such as free workshops and product trials while consumers from Australia, India, Thailand and Korea value personalised responses based on their consumption history with the brand.

"Beyond simply capturing customer data, the ability to analyse, contextualise and more importantly, act on insights gathered in real-time, are key to truly impress savvy consumers today," said Kontopoulos.