Companies Share Their Net Promotor Experiences
Here is just a couple of excerpts from an article by John Gaffney that appeared in 1to1Weekly, T-Mobile, Experian Share Net Promoter Experiences:
It would have been OK if Fred Reichheld, Satmetrix, and everyone else involved with Net Promoter took time to pat themselves on the back at the first annual Net Promoter conference in New York. But no laurels were evident at the conference, and none were rested on. Instead, organizers and panelists answered their own ultimate question -- how is Net Promoter working?
"Creating a customer-centric culture and driving client loyalty is a long-term business strategy, not a quick fix," Laura DeSoto, senior vice president of innovation and synergy at data firm Experian said. "Especially in a B2B environment with complex client relationships, it may take several survey cycles -- a full six to 12 months -- for a client to recognize your headway in delivering an excellent client experience in their survey response. They may not give you 'credit' for your gains until they've seen it consistently over a period of time. At Experian, once we delivered a great client experience consistently, our clients acknowledged this and rewarded us handsomely with a higher Net Promoter score."
Raimund Schmolze, vice president of customer insights at T-Mobile was also candid about his experiences with NetPromoter's limitations. The problems reflected in poor scores are not always simple product or service-related. In Q2 2006 T-Mobile offered a new pricing plan in the EU designed to drive customer acquisition. In the third quarter T-Mobile's NPS dropped. The problem, upon further analysis, was at the call center. New customers coming in from the new pricing model overloaded the call center and led to a downturn in the willingness to recommend.
Dr. Laura Brooks, codeveloper of Net Promoter and vice president of methodology and consulting at conference organizer Satmetrix, explained that discipline is crucial to a successful Net Promoter initiative. The "Net Promoter Discipline" encompasses executive sponsorship within companies, organizational alignment with the executive vision, and system infrastructure for collecting, analyzing, and distributing customer feedback within the organization.
"Our recent research on loyalty best practices has shown a gap between the vision executives articulate for loyalty initiatives and the reality of how successful companies are at driving operational changes and action at the front lines," Brooks said. "Net Promoter offers a solution to this gap, allowing organizations to rally around a powerful and straightforward score that links to customer loyalty and growth. But achieving results requires a disciplined approach that drives customer focus throughout the organization."
If your interested in NPS, be sure to check out our Customer Insight Analysis, which utilizes the NPS methodology as well as Fred Reicheld's book, The Ultimate Question. Also here's another related post, Execs Confront the Loyalty Gap. Finally, be sure to review the complete source article for much more on the NPS Conference.