From a B2B perspective I have found an uncanny correlation between the score received and the immediate intentions of the customer. Detractors usually leave within six months unless the sources of detraction are addressed. Promoters usually spend more. Both are good reasons to ask the Net Promoter question.

The efficiency of Net Promoter – and its success in securing high response rates – really helps in a B2B environment because it allows an organisation to survey the views of users and economic buyers and get a view from a very high proportion of customers. In this sense sample size doesn’t matter because what NPS measures is the personal experience of the individual NOT the organisation and the gap between this and the expectations the individual had. This allows B2B organisations to take action customer by customer, secure in the knowledge that they have been given a clear guide where to look for both issues and solutions. Readers of this blog might be interested in a new book called Answering the Ultimate Question written by senior executives at Satmetrix is a really practical guide to using Net Promoter productively. It can be purchased at Amazon via this link http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_ss_w_h_?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Answering+the+Ultimate+Question

The issue of the score is one area where people need to really understand what NPS can show them. It VERY DEFINITELY isn’t about the absolute number in a comparative sense. In our experience beauty products average about a score of 40 whereas software averages about zero but one wouldn’t rank a firm like Oracle a failure simply because its score is lower than Olay! The critical thing to do is collect regular data and thus build up a trustworthy picture of what the score means to the organisation. With reliable data it is then possible to run correlation or regression analysis to be able to identify any causal links if they exist.

In the meantime proving that you have listened to the customer feedback by closing the loop and acting on it will do much to help organisations improve their NPS score but more importantly improve their customer loyalty and business performance.

One of the comments on this site states that branding plays a very minor role in B2B, if much of a role at all – http://www.mindtimegroup.com/

The author states that after an exhaustive search of statistical and academic data, she didn’t find one study to show branding in b2b matters.

NPS can be useful for B2B, but studies by Maritz for example, have shown that customer perceptions of value, have even greater relevance to customer loyalty/advocacy than the “recommend” question used in Net Promoter. Makes sense really … businesses tend to be more rational and value is something that carries more weight than the smoke and mirrors you get with B2C brands.

One difficulty we find in business to business market research is that we can be dealing with small sample bases (sometimes as low as 30 customers in total). When using such a methodology it is sometimes difficult to insightfully deliver a robust NPS score due to the huge variability in results and the fact that half of all respondents can end up as Passives (scores of 7 or 8 out of 10).

What I do find interesting is how different companies stack up on this measurement. While the likes of Apple (NPS of 79%), Google (NPS of 73%) and American Express (NPS of 47%) the average firm splutters along at a Net Promoter Score efficiency of only 5 – 10%. In other words, promoters barely outnumber detractors. Many firms—and some entire industries—have negative Net Promoter Scores, examples of which include businesses with an associated social stigma (e.g., cigarettes) and businesses with different levels of service fulfillment.

Here at B2B International we do think that Net Promoter Score is a useful tool but care needs to be taken when comparing results and it is defintely more applicable when looking at larger sample sizes.

I have been using Net Promoter in just this way ever since the team at the London School of Economics, who proved its value in the UK, introduced it to me back in 2005. And, one of the creators, Satmetrix, drives global business improvement programmes for its customers by asking these additional questions. In my experience there is an uncanny correlation between the Net Promoter score received and the propensity for the customer to stay loyal and also to spend more.

So I totally agree that one question isn’t enough and that likelihood to purchase can also be an accurate predictor BUT I believe that Net Promoter’s true value is not as a predictive question but as a driver of customer-focused business improvement. In my view Net Promoter produces a recommendability Balance Sheet for an organisation and that business leaders who nurture their recommendability Balance Sheet as much as they do their financial one are much more likely to succeed – especially in today’s difficult economic conditions.