TL;DR: More Happy = More Growth
Big business ideas aren’t just for big businesses any more. There’s a very popular idea right now that big businesses are using to help guide the decisions they make, the markets they play in, and even how they treat their employees. That idea is the Net Promoter Score (NPS). In some corporate environments, they treat the wielders of their Net Promoter Scores with a cult leader like reverence. It gets pretty intense actually. I’m all for finding ways to measure the experience of the people you serve, and use that information to get better, but you should never put all your eggs in the one metric basket. That’s where this post comes in. I want to introduce you to the Net Promoter Score so you can add it to the toolbox of awesome things you’re keeping track of to make sure your business is growing sustainably over time. The extra great thing is that you don’t have to be a big business to implement NPS and there are FREE solutions that you can use right now to jump on the NPS bandwagon.
So, what exactly is a Net Promoter Score?
The NPS is a methodology that came out of Bain & Co. in the early 2000’s and it puts a process around identifying what keeps your customers and employees happy. The idea here is that happy customers and employees lead to organic growth over time. It might sound a little commonsensical but it’s a process you can use to measure not only how much people know/like/trust you but how likely they would be to refer your business to the people they care about. It’s a way to quantitatively measure very qualitative concepts like happiness, trust, and referability. You use the NPS consistently over time to collect feedback that will help you make better decisions when it comes to the future needs of all the people that rely on your business.
How do you calculate the Net Promoter Score?
The NPS is calculated using a survey. You ask a question and the takers of your survey respond or rate on a scale ranging 0 to 10. It could look something like, “How likely are you to refer this business to a friend or family member?” Then you rate 0 might be “Never in a million years and I hope you go out of business” and 10 might be “I already have and they’ve referred their family and friends”. Well it’s a little more nuanced than that but you get the idea. From the responses you collect you then divide them into three categories: Detractors, Passives, and Promoters.
Anyone that gives you a response with a score equal to or less than 6 are Detractors. Detractors weren’t typically thrilled by your value or service and aren’t likely to every refer or use you ever again. Unless they are especially motivated, like gave you a 0, they also aren’t likely to actively go out and lambaste you. You should keep track of where people fall when they are Detractors to see if their sentiments change over time. Can you turn a 3 into a 6? A 6 into a 7? Just because someone wasn’t thrilled with their experience in the first go-around doesn’t mean they are lost forever.
Passives are those that offer scores between 7 and 8. They were decently satisfied with their experience but would be open to switching to any competitor or substitute. Passives aren’t likely to actively refer you either but at least their experience was satisfactory. The challenge with receiving consistently Passive scores is that you aren’t memorable and your brand or business isn’t ever top of mind. It’s the professional equivalent of getting “meh’d”.
Promoters are your 9’s and 10’s. These are the people that absolutely love interacting with you. They loved their experiences so much they are likely to go out and tell people about it. They’ll actively refer to you, leave testimonials, and generally advocate for you. Promoters are those that land consistently way above the know/like/trust curve.
Ok so once you have all your scores you get to the Net Promoter Score by subtracting the percentage of customers who are Detractors from the percentage who are Promoters. When you do that you are going to end up with a score that will fall somewhere between -100 and 100. If everyone was a Detractor then you’d have a pure -100 score, meaning 100% of your responses to the survey yielded scores of 6 or under. A positive 100 comes from 100% of the responses being all Promoters, 9’s and 10’s.
NPS = %Promoters - %Detractors
What happens after I get my Net Promoter Score? And why should I care?
As a static metric the Net Promoter Score can tell you a few things. It’s a snapshot into the perception of your business. The more the negative the score the harder you might look into a particular issue or experience. It also shows you how your customers are self identifying after the engage with you. Your business probably won’t be all things to all people but are you doing the best you can for those people you do want to serve?
The real power of the NPS comes in running lots of the surveys over time. Over time you’ll be able to see how the decisions you make in your business impact the real experiences your customers are having. It’s also used internally to help keep you and your staff honest when it comes to the work that you’re doing. Then there are the proportions and watching them over time. Are your customers moving between groups? Are they moving within groups? Being able to quantitatively watch behavior gives you real feedback about your policies, procedures, and even branding choices.
I mentioned that you can do this for lots of parts of your business. Sure it’s great to see if people are willing to refer you but you can ask lots of questions. You can ask to see the likelihood of working together again, using a venue, managing a project, willingness to use a product or service, likely to use a tool, etc. Think about all the sites, services, products, and experiences you have on any given day. Any time someone asks you to take a quick survey or submit a review they’re looking for your input and to rate them for their NPS score. You’ll notice it happens most often when something changes like new features, people, or even menu items at a restaurant.
To figure out why you should care let’s throw it back to Bain & Co., the firm that originally introduced this metric. According to Bain & Co.’s NPS dedicated site there’s a correlation between your business’s growth and your Net Promoter Score. Your NPS accounts for somewhere between 20% and 60% of your business’s organic growth rate. That’s a big deal. No matter how clever your marketing, how authentic your branding, and how well you position yourself how people feel about you can be responsible for more than half of your growth. The neat thing there is that this doesn’t only apply to people buying something from you. Think about all the free apps you use, the websites you visit, or free things you consume. As a customer, you being willing to tell someone about something you liked is a big deal. Attention in this regard is worth just as much as actual money in some cases. Again not to sound too commonsensical here but, your customers will buy more, stay with you longer, refer more, and provide more constructive feedback the higher your NPS climbs.
So you should absolutely care!
Now that you’re onboard it’s time to put your new found respect for the Net Promoter Score into action. I would recommend starting with something simple and FREE like Survey Monkey. The best part about using Survey Monkey is that they have an entire space dedicate to NPS which includes templates and tools to help you make sense of the data you’re collecting. They didn’t pay me to say any of this, I’ve always been a fan of Survey Monkey and their NPS stuff is great! Oh, and did I mention it’s a small business’s favorite price...Free! Here’s the link if you want to check it out - https://www.surveymonkey.com/mp/net-promoter-score-survey-template/
After you set all that up you’ll need to figure out who to send this too. You can send out to your customers, your professional networks, and even your family and friends. Without diving too much into the magic of statistics I would just caution you about using sample sizes that are too small or too focused. Just because you send it to three people and they all give you a score of 6 doesn’t mean you should change everything you’re doing. Keep the data you’re collecting in context and you can always ask for additional feedback. Don’t forget that this is all because you’re trying to get better and sometimes that means coming to terms with the fact that people will have less than great experiences with you.
So, make sure you add a heartfelt message at the start sharing how important your audience’s feedback is and let them know that you’ll be sending these from time to time to help you be the best version of you possible. After that you’ll be on your way to collecting data, making decisions, using feedback, and growing sustainably like all the rest of the captains of industry.