Creating customer loyalty is a challenge for many businesses and Net Promoter Score is a great way of measuring and improving customer loyalty. It’s something I recommend businesses consider at my seminars and training workshops and something that I believe that any businesses serious about their customers should use! But does it actually mean anything?
Well, there’s some evidence from Bruce Temkin of Customer Experience Matters that it certainly does! His organisation examined NPS scores for companies across 19 industries based on feedback from 10,000 U.S. consumers and more than 95,000 pieces of feedback from consumers about those companies. His research found that:
- Promoters are almost six times as likely to forgive! They asked consumers about their likelihood to forgive a company if it delivered a bad experience and found that 64% of promoters are likely to forgive compared with 11% of detractors.
- Promoters are more than five times as likely to repurchase! 81% of promoters are likely to repurchase additional products and service compared with 16% of detractors.
- Promoters are more than twice as likely as detractors to actually recommend. 64% of promoters have recommended the company compared with 24% of detractors.
What are you doing to create loyalty and what are you doing to measure whether your efforts are paying off? Yes, it’s about creating remarkable customer experiences that makes them want to come back – that’s customer delight. It’s also about measuring whether you’re doing it right – Net Promoter Score is a great way of doing that!
For those that don’t know about it (check out the details here) it’s a simple question that finds out how likely customers are to recommend you to friends a colleagues. Those that rate you 9 or 10 (out of 10) are your Active Promoters (people who rave about you!) and those that rate you 0-6 are your ‘Detractors’ (the one’s who aren’t so keen!). Your Net Promoter Score (NPS) is the % of Active Promoters – % of Detractors.
It’s powerful because it doesn’t take into account the 7?s and 8?s (the ‘Passives’ – those who think you’re ok!) and can be (and should be) used as Key Performance Indicator that drives (and rewards) performance. You can also use it to benchmark your business against others and to measure improvements in performance. In the UK, Apple have an NPS of 67, First Direct has a NPS of 61 (and, if you’re interested, Andy Hanselman Consulting has an NPS of 64!)
So, go on, get working on creating customer delight, exceeding your customer expectations and building loyalty with your customers. Crucially, get measuring that you’re actually doing that!
