Lately every company I talk to seems to be in some stage of implementing a Customer Feedback Program. The most popular of these programs is the Net Promoter Score:
http://www.netpromoter.com/np/calculate.jsp
It’s gaining popularity because:
- It’s a simple quantitative metric that companies can measure and benchmark
- Its three customer segments “Promoters, Passives and Detractors” are easy for everyone in the enterprise to understand
- It demonstrates compelling evidence that improving Customer Experience delivers measurable increase in revenue (important in getting support from the C-Suite)
However, some companies are beginning to realize that after the initial investment and deployment of NPS, the return on the investment year-over-year may diminish. When initial Customer Experience improvements are made as a result of NPS feedback, the NPS score could improve dramatically, setting expectations that it will continue to improve at the same rate.
In order to sustain these NPS score improvements, some companies then use NPS to drill down into specific touch points, identify and measure, at a more granular level, all aspects of each touch point experience. The new VOC program then delivers that feedback to the organizational owners of that touchpoint to refine the customer experience.
Then what?
Over time, fixing “disatisfiers” and providing real time feedback for just-in-time response at every touch point will incrementally improve NPS scores but not to the dramatic degree initially experienced – and the C-Suite may grow impatient with the Voice of Customer Program’s diminishing ROI, given its significant cost.
But the real opportunity to build continuous NPS score improvements, long-term brand loyalty, increased share of wallet and maintain a premium price lies in using NPS as one of many diagnostic tools to guide a more strategic and holistic Customer Experience Strategy.
A critical tool to use alongside NPS is Customer Journey Mapping.
Creating a visual diagram of the total customer experience and enrolling key stakeholders in the creation of the visual map helps everyone in the organization see the interdependence of all the touch points in the company’s ecosystem at every stage in the customer’s relationship with the company.
It also will identify key Moments of Truth and prioritize important Pain Points for immediate attention, keeping every stakeholder’s attention focused on what’s most important to the customer and critical to the business regardless of functional ownership.
Companies should start by creating a “current state” Customer Journey Map and then use it to purposefully design a “future state” Customer Experience across all touch points. This future state Journey Map can be used to visually demonstrate and unify the company around a differentiating Brand Experience Strategy.
This longer term strategy is then more forward-looking rather than reactive and driven by purposeful design. It answers the question: what unique and compelling brand values define the customer experience ? – a question many companies seem to avoid by just focusing with more granularity on fixing disatisfiers. A longer-term Brand Experience Strategy should also include product design, branding and marketing to deliver the emotional as well as rational benefits of its unique Brand Experience proposition.
NPS is a good beginning. Adding Customer Journey Mapping and purposefully creating a differentiating Brand Experience proposition reflected in every touch point experience will create durable and measurable emotional loyalty not just an increase in Promoters’ intention to recommend.
Tags: brand experience, brand loyalty, customer feedback program, Customer Journey Mapping, experience improvements, Net Promoter Score, Voice of Customer
