As the IT industry as a whole matures, metrics are becoming increasingly important in order to track performance and determine organizational goals around quality and productivity.We spend a considerable amount of time at Alliance measuring what we’ve defined as the RightMetrics: items such as Schedule Variance, Resource Utilization and Defect Density.
I will assert that most companies, especially in Information Technology, DO NOT spend enough time listening to their customers.Equally, if not more important, is what Fred Reichheld coined as ‘The Ultimate Question’ in his book, published by the same name.(“The Ultimate Question“ was ranked #1 on the Wall Street Journal‘s Business Best-Sellers List and #1 on USA TODAY‘s Money Best-Sellers List.)
The single question is as follows:
“How likely is it that you would recommend our company to a friend or colleague?”
The answer to this question can be divided into three categories:
1)Promoters (9-10 rating)
2)Passives (7-8 rating)
3)Detractors (0-6 rating).
To calculate the ‘Net Promoter Score’ NPS®, the percentage of Detractors is subtracted from the percentage of Promoters.
We have adopted the Ultimate Question into our Right Experience customer loyalty program.This is a question we are passionate about asking during our customer online satisfaction surveys as well as the site interviews we conduct face-to-face with clients.
At Alliance we scored a 60, scoring nearly 2x better than our closest competitor.And we won’t stop there.We’re very focused on improving our performance to move every customer into the ‘promoter’ category.
Do you know your score and how you compare to your competitors?
We’d love to hear your questions /comments about Net Promoter and the Customer Experience.
Thanks!
- Lauren Feehrer
Note: Satmetrix Systems, Inc has some terrific literature on their website – from Case Studies to Industry Benchmark Reports.
Interesting topic Lauren. I’m curious on how you account for / avoid potential responder bias when doing your survey? For instance, presumably people who love your company and would score it a 9 or 10 will be happy to fill out an online survey. But people who are annoyed with your company or who actively dislike it probably wouldn’t bother filling out an online survey because they either don’t care about the results or don’t think their feedback will matter. How do you avoid that situation?
Hello ‘The Customer is always right,’
That’s a great question and you raise an important point. A non-response is actually a response in itself. By not responding, the customer could be telling you they don’t feel invested in the relationship with the organization and don’t feel it appropriate to provide feedback. But it could also mean the survey is too complicated, the person is too busy to respond, or the person doesn’t have any issues and thinks you are doing a fine job.
Most of the customer service and NPS experts seem to agree to treat them as ‘passive’ – since they haven’t responded either positively or negatively. Unless you want to be hard on yourself, you should not assume that a non-response will be negative. If you add them to your passive count, the percentages will certainly change. If you do go this route, make sure this is noted the calculation. Certainly a best practice is to find other opportunities to discuss feedback with the non-responders via other methods.
Laura Brooks, who heads research and consulting for Satmetrix, has stated the following in her blog: “If a customer fails to respond, should you classify them as a Detractor? How do you interpret their silence? The answer depends on who is not responding and the role they represent within your customer base. Is it one of your most valuable customers, as determined by revenue, margin, up-sell potential, tenure, referral power, or any other criteria you care to define? If so, you might want to take a look at (Satmetrix CEO) Richard Owen’s recent blog, The Case of the Missing Executive, to determine how to classify them.
http://www.netpromoter.com/netpromoter_community/blogs/richard_and_laura/2006/03/15/the-case-of-the-missing-executive
At Alliance we have been able to increase our response rates over the last couple years through communication. By speaking to our customers about the importance we place on the survey, plus sending email reminders, our responses are around 50%. We are always working to increase that any comments/suggestions on that topic are welcome!
In addition to the goal of raising the NPS or overall customer satisfaction score, I’d also advise companies to set a goal to raise the response rate.
Thanks,
Lauren