What is Net Promoter Score (NPS)?

Net Promoter Score (NPS) is a customer loyalty measure based on one question, how likely someone is to recommend your company or product on a 0 to 10 scale, reported as promoters minus detractors.

At a glance

• Fred Reichheld of Bain & Company introduced it in the December 2003 Harvard Business Review article “The One Number You Need to Grow”.
• Promoters answer 9 or 10, passives 7 or 8, detractors 0 to 6.
• Formula: NPS = % of promoters minus % of detractors. It runs from -100 to 100.
• It measures stated intent to recommend, not actual behavior. Pair it with retention data.
• Its claim to predict growth has been disputed by some researchers, so treat it as one signal rather than the answer.

How to calculate NPS

Ask the question the same way every time: “How likely are you to recommend [company] to a friend or colleague?” Count the answers in each band, turn them into percentages of all responses, and subtract the detractor share from the promoter share. Passives count in the total but not in either group.

Example (illustrative): 120 customers answer. 54 give a 9 or 10 (45%), 42 give a 7 or 8 (35%) and 24 give 6 or lower (20%). NPS is 45 minus 20, or 25. If the same survey a quarter later shows 40% promoters and 30% detractors, NPS falls to 10, even though most customers still score you 7 or higher.

Always ask a follow-up: “What’s the main reason for your score?” The comments are usually more useful than the number, because they tell you what to fix.

NPS in B2B

In B2B, one account has several people who use, buy and approve the product, and they rarely agree. A champion might score 10 while the users score 5. Survey several roles per account, and roll the scores up by account as well as by person, or a happy buyer hides an unhappy team.

Response rates also matter more with a small customer base. A score from 15 responses moves a lot with each answer, so report the number of responses next to the score.

Common NPS mistakes

• Treating the score as the goal. Teams that chase the number start asking only happy customers.
• Ignoring the comments. The reason behind the score is where the action is.
• No closed loop. If detractors never hear back, the survey tells them nobody’s listening.
• Reading it alone. A high NPS with rising logo churn means the people answering aren’t the people leaving.
• Comparing across industries. Scores vary widely by market, so compare with your own past results first.

How NPS shows up in a revenue system

NPS is most useful as one input to a customer health score, next to usage, support tickets and payment history, and as a topic for the QBR. Reading those signals early and acting before renewal is part of the Customer Activation and Expansion work we run. See how we run customer experience.

Terms that sit next to NPS

NPS measures loyalty. CSAT measures satisfaction with a specific interaction, and CES measures how hard something was to do. Churn rate shows whether any of it turned into customers staying.