NPS (Net Promoter Score)
Operations & Workflow
Net Promoter Score is a customer satisfaction metric based on a single question: how likely is the customer to recommend the business to a friend or colleague, rated on a scale of zero to ten.
Definition
Net Promoter Score is a customer satisfaction metric based on a single question: how likely is the customer to recommend the business to a friend or colleague, rated on a scale of zero to ten. Respondents who answer 9 or 10 are Promoters. Those who answer 7 or 8 are Passives. Those who answer 0 through 6 are Detractors. The NPS is calculated by subtracting the percentage of Detractors from the percentage of Promoters. The result is a score between negative 100 and positive 100.
How It Works
An NPS survey is typically sent at a defined point in the customer relationship: after onboarding, after a completed project, or at regular intervals for ongoing service customers. The survey is usually one question, optionally followed by an open-text field asking the customer to explain their rating. Low scores trigger an immediate follow-up to understand the issue. High scores may trigger a referral request or a review ask. Tracking NPS over time shows whether customer satisfaction is improving or declining across the overall customer base.
Why It Matters
NPS is valuable because it is simple enough that customers actually complete it, and because it produces a single number that can be tracked and compared over time. A business that surveys customers regularly and responds to low scores creates a feedback loop that identifies service problems before they cause widespread churn. The open-text responses often reveal specific issues, processes, or team members that are consistently causing dissatisfaction.
Example
A pest control company sends an NPS survey by text two days after every service appointment. Responses of 6 or below automatically create a task for the operations manager to call the customer within 24 hours. Over six months, the company identifies that one particular service technician receives significantly more low scores than others. Additional training and a routing change for that technician improve NPS from 42 to 67 over the following quarter.
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