CPM Australia research shows information accuracy now matters to 91% of consumers, up from 58% in 2016. The stakes have never been higher.
What’s happening: As global delivery models evolve, the question is no longer whether work should be onshore or offshore.
Why this matters: With 94% of Australians having stopped purchasing from at least one company due to negative experience, businesses must orchestrate local teams, offshore scale and AI into connected ecosystems.
As global delivery models evolve, the question is no longer whether work should be onshore or offshore. Both remain essential, but their roles are changing.
Traditional outsourcing models were built primarily on scale and labour efficiency, but the dynamics of service have shifted. Customer interactions are becoming more complex, more regulated, and more context dependent. In this environment, proximity, cultural understanding, and sector fluency hold increasing value.
The broader market context reinforces this shift. Australia’s contact centre and CX services market has become a multi-billion dollar sector growing at an annual rate of 11-14%. Demand is being driven by rising expectations, increased digitisation and a growing need for partners that can blend human capability with automation and global delivery. At the same time, applied AI has moved from concept to real operational utility. Organisations that invested early in foundational data and automation capability are already seeing improvements in speed, accuracy and cost efficiency, with more sophisticated, agent-assisting AI models becoming commercially viable.
These dynamics mean the structure and purpose of CX delivery must change. Local teams are now critical for interactions that require nuanced judgement, industry-specific knowledge, or deeper understanding of customer expectations. They provide the context and capability needed to manage sensitive enquiries, ensure compliance, and deliver experiences that feel aligned to local standards. Offshore and nearshore teams remain vital for achieving scale, speed, and cost efficiency. They continue to support high volume transactions, back-office work, and rapid operational response.
The future of CX lies in orchestrating these capabilities, so they operate as one connected ecosystem. Work flows to the environment that delivers the highest value, not the lowest cost. Onshore teams anchor complexity. Offshore teams anchor scale. Digital infrastructure and AI tie both together, ensuring consistency, insight and real time coordination. This combination strengthens the overall system and lifts the standard of the customer experience it delivers.
Expectations outpacing delivery
The latest national research shows that Australian consumers now expect more from service than at any point in the past decade. Access to correct information is rated as the most important element of good service. Knowledgeable representatives are nearly as critical. Customers want accuracy first, then empathy, then efficiency.
Despite these rising expectations, two thirds of Australians believe companies still place limited importance on delivering service excellence. This long-standing gap between what customers expect and what organisations prioritise remains one of the fundamental drivers of dissatisfaction, churn and negative word of mouth.
The consequences of this gap are significant. In the past year, 94% of Australians stopped purchasing from at least one company due to a negative experience. This is not an occasional reaction, but mainstream behaviour. Customers no longer persist with brands that make service difficult. They move on.
This shift is reinforced by how widely Australians share their experiences. About nine in 10 customers pass on negative interactions to others, often across both personal and digital networks. Positive experiences also circulate strongly, but negative ones spread further and faster. This makes service quality not only a customer issue but a reputational one.
The human factor intensifies
Australians remain deeply reliant on human support for meaningful or complex enquiries. For issues that require judgement, clarity or sensitivity, speaking with a person remains the overwhelming preference, with 77% choosing phone contact as their first option and more than half choosing live chat with a human. These preferences have strengthened steadily over the past decade.
Self-service channels have their place. Customers are comfortable using well-designed websites or FAQ pages for simple enquiries. AI powered chat is increasingly accepted for routine tasks. But only a small percentage prefer automated chat for simple interactions, and almost no one chooses it for complex ones.
The data also reveals why human capability matters. Unfriendly staff and representatives who cannot resolve an enquiry are the top reasons customers stop purchasing from a brand. By contrast, satisfaction and repurchase rates spike when customers have positive experiences. The commercial leverage of a well-trained, empowered frontline team remains profound.
Awareness of AI in customer service is high, with more than half of Australians reporting strong familiarity with AI powered tools. The benefits they recognise most clearly are speed, reduced wait times, and 24-hour availability. Customers are open to AI when it simplifies the experience and removes friction.
The larger transformation is happening behind the scenes. AI is shifting the economics of service by absorbing low complexity tasks, automating triage, improving routing, and giving human representatives real time insight. It adds consistency across channels and creates a foundation for predictive service models that prevent issues before they occur.
Rather than replacing people, AI amplifies their capability. It frees humans from repetitive work and positions them for the higher value interactions that customers care about most. This is especially important in Australia, where expectations for accuracy, expertise and human empathy continue to rise.
Connected ecosystems emerge
Customers experience brands as a single entity, but many organisations still operate through fragmented structures. Disconnected systems, inconsistent information and siloed teams create the very pain points customers find most frustrating. These breakdowns contribute directly to churn and poor satisfaction.
Research shows that when customers continue buying after a negative experience, it is often because they have no alternative, not because they are loyal. Price sensitivity also increases when service weakens. This means poor CX does not only damage its reputation. It erodes margins.
Connected CX ecosystems address these issues by integrating people, platforms, processes, and data into a coordinated network. They reduce handoffs, shorten resolution times, improve accuracy, and create a consistent experience across touchpoints. They also enable rightshoring to operate at its best, with work flowing intelligently across locations and functions.
The next decade of customer experience will be shaped by organisations that design services as a connected ecosystem rather than a collection of channels or locations. The most effective models will combine human judgement, intelligent automation, and multi-region delivery into a coherent system that adapts in real time to customer needs. Expectations will continue to rise, AI will continue to expand its role, and customers will continue to judge brands on the consistency and quality of every interaction. Those that invest early in orchestration, capability and insight will set the pace for the industry and define what good looks like for years to come.
Keep up to date with our stories on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
