Customer Education Statistics: Why Customer Training Matters

Ever ask yourself how Simone Biles, Michael Phelps, and other Olympians became such dominant winners in their sport? Innate talent and unworldly genetics, for sure, but also something equally important: excellent training.

When people have the right tools and resources, the hard work ahead of them gets a bit easier. A seemingly insurmountable goal can be broken down into smaller, more accessible steps. By learning—then practicing—how to reach that next step, you can clear hurdles with confidence.

Customer education follows the same philosophy. By teaching your clients how to navigate your products and leverage your services, you help them get the value promised in your sales and marketing collateral—increasing the odds of a satisfying customer experience.

You know the value education offers, but do your executives and key stakeholders? In this article, we’ll equip you with customer education statistics you can use to prove ROI and expand your training efforts.

The Value of Customer Education Programs

If your senior leadership team still considers education a “soft play,” it’s time to recalibrate. As education technology becomes more sophisticated, the benefits of customer learning are stacking up.

Here are five compelling reasons to invest in a customer training program.

1. Increase product adoption.

It’s the nightmare of any software company: You build a market-defining solution and manage to earn some customers. Unfortunately, the people you’re onboarding aren’t using the product. And when people aren’t engaged, they don’t tend to stick around.

Customer education programs prevent that scenario by helping clients understand the power of what they’re purchasing. It’s why SaaS companies invest so heavily in making products accessible and easy to use. By reducing in-app friction, you help clients find value faster—a win for all involved.

2. Ensure customer success.

Customer service is a high-stakes job—and according to Qualtrics, those stakes are only getting higher. Businesses are currently jeopardizing $3.7 trillion due to bad customer experiences, up from a $3.1 trillion projection in 2023. 

Couple this with a statistic from Salesforce—that 53% of customers expect companies to anticipate their needs, yet only 33% feel companies address issues proactively—and the job can feel particularly thankless. It’s hard to address issues before they happen.

Enter customer learning. By providing clients with personalized, self-serve guidance, you help your user base troubleshoot faster. Not only does this improve customer satisfaction, but it reduces the load on your support teams, so they can handle more difficult cases.

3. Decrease support costs.

When your customer support team is free to tackle more intricate work, their efficiency tends to rise. No more “drop everything” phone calls because a client can’t navigate their web browser. In a 2024 Forrester report commissioned by Intellum, we found that companies that invest in customer education see a 16% reduction in support requests and a 7% drop in support costs.

By offering timely education that addresses common client issues, you allow customer service to focus on providing a higher quality of service. In a world where 71% of clients make purchases based on quality of support, that makes customer education teams an invaluable lifeline.

4. Improve customer retention.

By keeping your clients engaged and happy, you reduce churn and increase the likelihood of renewal and expansion opportunities. By investing in regular learning content, you show clients that you’re as committed to their success as they are to yours. 

5. Achieve greater business outcomes.

Consider all of the above, and you begin to see the impact education can have in driving business goals. Your clients are everything. Without them, what’s the point of building a product or marketing a service? 

Still, it can be hard to tie business outcomes back to a client’s learning experience. Thankfully, education platforms like Intellum offer robust data reporting you can use to show ROI. 

30 Customer Education Statistics to Prove ROI

Behind every successful customer education program, there’s data to back it up. 

Unsure how to measure customer training ROI? Here are 30 customer education statistics you can plug and play to articulate the value of your education efforts:

The value of customer education

• 96% of organizations have recouped their investment in customer education. (Intellum)
• 86% of companies have seen a positive return on customer education. (Intellum)
• 80% of customers say the experience a business provides is as important as its offerings. (Salesforce)
• 43% of companies that implement an education program experience increased revenue. (Intellum)
• Businesses plan to nearly triple their spending on customer education between 2024 and 2026. (Intellum)
• 95% of customer education teams plan to leverage AI within the next 12 to 18 months (up from 51% today). (Intellum)

Product adoption statistics

• 73% of customers expect better personalization from companies as technology improves. (Salesforce)
• 47% of education teams plan to invest in microlearning in 2024. (LinkedIn)
• The average customer education program increases product adoption by 38%. (Intellum)
• Customer education programs are increasing product retention by an average of 22%. (Intellum)

Customer retention statistics

• 53% of customers expect companies to anticipate their needs. (Salesforce)
• Customer education programs are increasing product engagement by an average of 31%. (Intellum)
• The average customer education program increases customer satisfaction by 26%. (Intellum)
• 56% of companies that implement an education program see improved customer retention. (Intellum)

Support costs statistics

• 71% of consumers make buying decisions based on the quality of customer support. (Salesforce)
• 61% of customers prefer self-service materials for simple issues. (Salesforce)
• The average company that invests in customer education sees a 16% decrease in support questions. (Intellum)
• The average customer education program reduces annual customer support costs by 7%. (Intellum)

Advocating for customer education

• 23% of companies say their customers use half or less of their product’s full functionality. (Intellum)
• 39% of brands saw a decline in customer experience over the past 12 months. (Forrester)
• 52% of organizations lack the tools to build training resources. (Intellum)
• 42% of organizations lack the personnel to manage and/or moderate training. (Intellum)
• 30% of organizations lack executive support for customer education. (Intellum)
• 14% of companies don’t have a clear owner for education. (Intellum)

Why invest in customer education

• Only 4% of companies describe their education program as formalized, scalable, and curriculum-based. (Intellum)
• 78% of high-success organizations have fully formalized customer education programs (vs. just 35% of low-success organizations). (Intellum)
• 70% of high-success organizations value scalability in their education programs. (Intellum)
• 60% of companies that invest in curriculum-based education experience increased revenue. (Intellum)
• 80% of high-success organizations leverage multiple types of data in their education programs. (Intellum)
• 57% of high-success organizations value personalized content and learning paths. (Intellum)

Get More Customer Education Statistics to Prove ROI

Download our 2024 Forrester report, and bring the biggest findings back to your executive team. Read about the state of customer education and discover the biggest benefits, so you can prove ROI and get the buy-in you seek.