Net Promoter Score has been one of the central topics in conversations between CX professionals for years now. If you regularly read CXM, you know we published many articles on this subject, both from positive and negative points of view. Whether we like it or not, NPS is still widely used for keeping tabs on customer happiness and satisfaction.
In fact, we can go as far as to say detractors on the NPS scale make the worst dream of CX professionals. Focused on customer satisfaction and relevant metrics, experts can find themselves obsessed with those three scary words: “Would not recommend”. If you’re one of them, you came to the right place! The CXM team is here to help you overcome your challenges and turn detractors into prospective customers.
What is Net Promoter Score?
You probably know the basics of NPS already but let us give you a short overview for a better context. Net Promoter Score stands for a metric used in customer experience programmes. It measures customer satisfaction and loyalty, allowing companies to track how people perceive their brand and predict business growth.
NPS is measured through a survey that contains one single question:
“On a scale of 0 to 10, how likely are you to recommend this company’s product or service to a friend or a colleague?”
The scale further translates into the measurement between -100 to 100, indicating customer satisfaction with your brand, service, or product. How do you come up with the correct measurement?
You calculate NPS depending on how customers answer the question and whether they are willing to recommend you to other people. There are:
- Promoters (score of 9 and 10) – most enthusiastic customers who are likely to recommend the brand and increase referral rates.
- Passives (score of 7 and 8) – satisfied customers who are neutral and not likely to spread neither positive nor negative word-of-mouth.
- Detractors (score of 0 to 6) – unsatisfied customers who won’t stick around or repeat purchases. They might even discourage others from engaging with your brand.
When you subtract the percentage of detractors from the percentage of promotes, you get an accurate NPS. A final result is a whole number that indicates customer satisfaction and mostly represents as follows:
- Under 30 – bad NPS
- Between 30 and 50 – good NPS
- Over 70 – excellent NPS
Still, brands should not focus solely on the NPS results when measuring customer satisfaction. Although the metric allows companies to estimate the overall health of the business, there have been many discussions on its effectiveness. This is a whole new topic we won’t be covering today, but you can read more about it here.
How can NPS detractors impact your business?
Today, we dive deep into the reasons behind your customers dropping out on their journeys and becoming detractors. Believe it or not, many brands struggle with negative feedback, as finding its roots is not as easy as it may seem.
Detractors are loud and clear about their issues and opinions, but one needs to gather and interpret correctly all the data available to get to the bottom line of the problem. If businesses don’t do it right, they may run at a risk of:
- Increased churn
It’s good to observe detractors as customers that are likely to churn every second. People who have rated your business very low are simply unhappy with your products and services, and they may drop out from the journey at any point and time. Therefore, perceiving them as a potential loss to the community will inspire you to act instantly and prevent that churn.
- Jeopardized brand image
As we already mentioned, detractors are usually very loud about the issues they have with a brand. They are blunt and speak openly, which means there’s a huge potential for them to jeopardize your brand image. Moreover, detractors tend to spread the negative image even further than promoters. If you want to avoid a negative brand reputation, dealing with their inquiries should be one of your top priorities.
- Lower Sales
Lastly, unhappy customers don’t buy products or services, which directly impacts one brand’s bottom line. A high number of detractors lowers the sales and affects the revenue. Considering it’s more expensive to acquire new customers than retain existing ones, investing in your detractors is a good choice.
Tips on turning detractors into promoters
We know no organisation wants to hear the words “would not recommend”, but the chances are, it will happen along the way. Instead of focusing all your energy and strengths on this phrase, you should think of a way to resolve the issues that lead to it. Only this way, you can be sure the number of detractors will decrease in the long turn. CXM gathers expert tips on the matter and advises how you can turn detractors into promoters.
Acknowledge the feedback of your customers
The first step in changing your NPS score should be in encouraging customer feedback. Not everyone is ready to share their opinions, especially when it’s hard to predict the outcomes. Therefore, make sure your customers know you are on the journey to improving their experiences.
Once you declare your intention and goals, your customers are more likely to communicate their problems. Take a proactive approach and act on all the feedback you get. Above everything, when faced with negative feedback, assess the situation and seek productive solutions.
Acknowledging the problem brings you one step closer to the solution, and customers will appreciate the efforts. Therefore, don’t hesitate to reach out to your customers, offer support, and make it clear their voice has been heard and acted upon.
Get to the bottom of the issue
The next step should be in focusing on the issue itself. You should get to the bottom of your customers’ unhappiness and resolve the reasons behind it. By showing understanding and empathy, you only scratched the surface of a deeply rooted dissatisfaction. Now is the time to change things for your customers and show them just how valuable they are to your business.
Once you address the issue and follow up with the customers, you’ll most certainly get awarded for your efforts. Customers will appreciate your actions, and you’ll get another chance to prove how customer-centric is your organisation.
Work on the relationship
The work doesn’t stop when you turn a detractor around, as you need to repair the damaged relationship with your customers. Moreover, the main goal of all actions above is not solely in increasing the NPS score – it’s about building strong relationships with all your customers, so you can increase trust and loyalty.
Therefore, continue talking with people and gathering their feedback. It will allow you to improve your operations and completely prevent those three scary words “Would not recommend”.
Check up on all customers
You should also make sure your other customers don’t become detractors! This could happen if you neglect the needs of your promoters and passives, thinking their preferences and demands don’t change over time. To make sure you’re on the clear with NPS, you can use customer journey mapping to track people’s interactions with your brand and determine the common pain points.
Surveys are also useful for this purpose, although implementing multichannel experience can resolve your need for any additional measurement tool. Read more about it here.
Lastly, our final tip for you today would be to stay open to communication, quick, and productive. Your customers will value your every single effort, so don’t think anything you do will go unnoticed. As long as you recognize areas for improvements and deliver on your promises, you won’t be hearing “would not recommend” anytime soon.