This analysis is based on 30,670 customer reviews of 108 tablets published online by December 24th 2011.
To insure statistical representation and accuracy of results, we have focused on 18 tablets that were reviewed at least 100 times this year. That may mean that some tablets that were introduced toward the end of the year did not qualify for this report.
We have studied before the correlation between number of reviews published online and a number of units shipped, and therefore found it important to use it for comparison.
The most customer-reviewed tablet of 2011 are Amazon Kindle Fire (3,572), Apple iPad 1 and 2 (2,302 combined) and HP TouchPad (970).
Amazon Kindle Fire announcement dominated media and not surprisingly received a disproportional number of customer feedback after it was released. It’s value proposition and content availability are highly anticipated to make long expected dent in iPad market supremacy. The number of reviews seem to predict that this is the case.
Even though Kindle Fire OS is build on the Android platform, it has sufficient proprietary layer to view it separately from a more common versions.
From the date of TouchPad introduction the WebOS customers were the most satisfied lot (1.39) and the uncertainty about its future does not seem to extinguish their enthusiasm. Apple iPad customers are very close behind at (1.35). It is interesting to note that iPad 2 version of iOS have substantially improved its overall average satisfaction score.
The Kindle Fire OS experience score falls 0.03 points behind the Android, which is well within the margin of error, while both somewhat exceeded their customers’ expectations.
Our Market Intelligence Analysis of the tablet segment indicates that the following attributes of customer experience are most important to them:
- Usability – 11.45% of all opinions expressed
- Reliability – 9.45% of all opinions expressed
- Price – 3.21% of all opinions expressed
- Screen – 2.89% of all opinions expressed
- Sound Quality – 2.52% of all opinions expressed
- Compact Size – 2.10% of all opinions expressed
- Screen Size – 1.70% of all opinions expressed
- Battery Life – 1.63% of all opinions expressed
- Customer Support – 1.40% of all opinions expressed
- Operating System – 0.95% of all opinions expressed
You can get more detailed explanation of Attributes and Importance by watching this short video.
In terms of overall satisfaction, Samsung Galaxy tablet (7?) has earned the top customer satisfaction rating (1.53) and Huawei Ideo 7 tablet (1.50) came within a statistical tie, while Archos 7 Home tablet (0.82) and Velocity Micro Cruz tablet (0.95) are on the very bottom of the list.
To get more specific insights into the dynamics of the tablet customer perceptions, we sampled a market segment by analyzing the most experienced (i.e., most reviewed) models representing different operating systems.
- Amazon Kindle Fire – 3,572 customers
- Apple iPad 2 – 999 customers
- RIM Blackberry Playbook – 281 customers
- HP TouchPad – 970 customers
- Motorola Xoom – 588 customers
- Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 inch – 615 customers
More details and customer feedback verbatim are available via access to the dynamic dashboard for this segment on request. Watch this video for navigation tips.
