Net Promoter News: NPS Now Goes to 11 – “One More Likelier”
Following hot on the heels (clogs?) of our Dutch Effect post yesterday, we were immediately contacted by a local Amsterdam enterprise, who are determined to show that the Dutch are not low markers when it comes to Net Promoter® Score.
Local businessmen Hertz van Rental, is the owner of the “Stoot Je Hoofd Niet” Snack-Restaurant [trans: "Don't Hit Your Head"], slap-bang in the centre of the old Jordaan, Amsterdam’s former working-class-gone-hip neighbourhood, and represents a collective of bars and cafes in the area. The venues sell the well known Dutch delicacy, the tasty “Kroket” (or “Kroketje” to the cognescenti), a filling food which is the ideal complement to a beer, while enjoying the bar singers belting out sentimental Johnny Jordaan or Tante Leen numbers. The organisation goes by the name of the Jordan Organisation for Kroketje Excellence, and is dedicated to high standards of quality and service for this important part of the experience.
“Our Net Promoter Scores are so high” says Mr van Rental, “that our members regularly get an NPS of more than 90″. He concedes that booze and singing might help push up the scoring a little, but showed us verbatim comments from customers along the lines of “I would give you 11 out of 10 for this Kroket”. He challenged us to help his organisation take better feedback from their customers.
I am proud to say the CustomerGauge organisation rose to the challenge.
Net Promoter News: Labor Finders work 63, JUNK clears 80, Schwab long on 46, NPS Comes out of Closet at 80
News that the world of market research seems to be coming to its senses. This item caught our attention: Not Part of the Future: Long Surveys. Money quote: “One current element of market research that is not probable or preferred is the LONG survey.” (source). Another from the superbly named Bad Research; No Biscuit asked “What in the world can you learn from a sixty minute survey that you can’t learn from a 5-minute one?” (Just Say No Already). Finally in this group: “Customer Sat. studies used to be overtly long and terrifying – until Bain, McKinsey and BCG told all the CEO’s of the world that the only thing they should care about is the single question on “How likely are you to recommend?”” (source).
Our stand on this: The survey of the future will be a Net Promoter survey and like have Two Questions, tops. Oh wait – the future is here today! Best example: “pure Net Promoter implementation: two questions using simple, clean interface and minimal hassle for the customer!” Source: Vivmag, Survey hall of fame and shame)
Satmetrix publishes Net Promoter Leaders
Satmetrix released 2010 Net Promoter Industry Benchmarks for the insurance, financial services, airlines, telecommunications, technology, retail and online services industries. Some highlights: USAA 81, Apple 78, Amazon.com 71, Trader Joe’s 68, Wegmans 67, Costco 66, eBay 65, Facebook 65, Jet Blue 64, Google 63. Other notables: Insurance: Geico 41. Health insurance: Cigna -28.
Retail drill down: Amazon’s score drooped from 74% to 71%, eBay improved from 61% to 65% and Barnes & Noble pushed from 58% to 59%. eBay and Amazon had just 5% of their customers categorized as detractors. Among multichannel retailers, both Best Buy Co. Inc. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc.’s online stores had higher NPS scores than the bricks-and-mortar stores with scores of 45% and 46%, respectively, compared to in-store scores of 29% and 41%. Conversely, Target Corp.’s in-store score was 52%, compared to its online score of 44%. Widely covered here (RW), here (own) and here (IR)
Company Results
Labor Finders at 63.
200 branches Labor Finders International, largest privately held industrial labor staffer in US beat all-comers in Inavero/CareerBuilder Best of Staffing 2010 NPS smackdown. Inavero claim staffing industry averages Net Promoter score of 40%. Labor Finders clocked in a score of 63%. Source – self puff
PrintAudit impress at 76.
The Canadian print management outfit PrintAudit self-scores NPS 76. Run o’the mill self puff with zero details on methods, but a quite impressive page with 250 testimonials on (some looked like they might have been politely persuaded. No matter, still some achievement). Source: Horse’s mouth.
Any Old Iron?
Brian Scudamore’s 1-800-GOT-JUNK junk removal business with 250 franchises is a word-of-mouth driven business. He explains NPS-led philosophy and posts a score of 80. Company drills down NPS to franchise, even to the truck level. Source
Schwab brokers 46
Charles Schwab go long on NPS with a new high of 46, leading the Brokerage and Investment sector. Source
Fight! PEER1 vs Allcomers
Hoster PEER1 says its NPS is 36, trouncing the rest of the IT services industry’s lowly 7. In a confrontational statement MD Dominic Monkhouse calls out his rivals: “To improve transparency over service quality PEER 1 Hosting believes all serious hosting service providers should measure and publish their Net Promoter Score“. No mention of sample size or details, natch, but we like the way this one is going. source
Out of the Closet at 80
Wardrobe-sters California Closets (New England Franchise) have been measuring their Net Promoter Score. Striving to make a difference in their customers homes and lives, they have found a convenient tie rack to tidily hang their NPS of 79.9. Source: CupboardLove
ABB Engineers Customer Experience via NPS
Bill Black, Group Senior Qual and Ops Excellence Veep at ABB yaks about customer confidence best practices for maintaining and improving customer confidence in a podcast, highlighting how they use Net Promoter Score as a key customer sat. measure. Advice on external/internal satisfaction, plus how to turn around a drop in confidence. Source
Award for best use of decimal points in an NPS Press Release
Ski Butlers (seen around this parish before) got a new NPS score. 86.39 percent. Loving the precision! Source: BadMathbyPRpeople
And finally… Zappos sues Disney
We racked our brains for another suitable April Fool on Net Promoter but struck out this year due to lack of creativity. But I was taken in for a few seconds by the “Zappos Sues Disney” article. The meat: “Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos, says it’s just one battle in his efforts to prevent companies from making misleading claims. The lawsuit alleges that Disneyland’s tagline of being “The Happiest Place on Earth” is “clearly false, deceptive, and confusing to the marketplace”,and cites internal Net Promoter Score (NPS) metrics that suggest that the designation should be given to Zappos.com, Inc“. ‘Nuff respec for this prank, Hsieh, but we’ll beat you next April 1!
ChokeyGauge launched to measure Prison Satisfaction and “Voice of the Jailbird”
PRESS RELEASE: Directness BV, a company that measures customer satisfaction, announced today (1 April 2008) a new service named “ChokeyGauge” to extend its CustomerGauge range. Like CustomerGauge, ChokeyGauge will measure loyalty – although in this case it is less “Voice of Customer”, more “Voice of Prisoner”. The results will be shown in a new metric named “Net Perpetrator Score” (NPS) based on the industry standard Net Promoter® Score* (NPS).
“Following the tradition of surveys in the hotel business, we are delighted to launch a service for other, more travel-challenged members of society. They can vote on how likely they are to recommend their place of incarceration to other fellow cons, lags and jailbirds” said Adam Dorrell, Managing Director of Directness.
Directness was approached by a well-connected (but publicity shy) family wishing to have a common method of comparing standards in prisons. The sponsored survey was paid in advance by the Criminals Association for Standardisation and Harmonisation (CASH).
Avril Pfuhl, spokeswoman for the pressure group Justice for Obsessive Kleptomanics and Embezzlers said “Today marks a turning point for those ‘doing time’. Whether you are guest of the Hilton Hotel, or just of Her Majesty, customer feedback is valuable. Even if they have limited choices, feedback comments on hardness of beds, shower facilities, exercise options and food will surely improve conditions in ‘the ‘Big House’ for returning inmates. And remember, a smile costs nothing.”
A sample survey can be seen here, together with some selected comments from former inmates: ChokeyGauge
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