Customer experience (CX) plays a key role in every buyer's journey. One way to measure CX is through the Net Promoter Score (NPS).

NPS helps you gauge how customers feel about your business and  helps you track customer sentiment over time. Since its introduction over 20 years ago, NPS has become a standard benchmark for gauging performance against competitors. Many companies already include NPS in their customer experience strategies because it’s easy to use.

One of the most popular customer loyalty surveys, NPS is considered an extremely cost-effective way to gather product feedback, segment customers, and make data-backed decisions. It’s no surprise, then, that higher NPS scores are linked to business growth. When combined with other data, NPS reveals challenges and helps plan future growth. It shows the actions that can drive change in both CX and business results.

Improving your NPS can directly affect key metrics, such as:

• Boosting revenue
• Reducing customer service costs
• Lowering risks
• Increasing customer lifetime value (CLV)
• Retaining more customers
• Reducing customer effort

That said, you need more than customer feedback to improve your NPS. That’s where we’ve got you covered. This article dives into actionable strategies to elevate your NPS and lays out a step-by-step plan to help you strengthen customer loyalty and drive meaningful improvements in your brand perception. 

What Can Affect Your NPS Score?

NPS measures how likely your customers are to recommend your brand. It’s based on a single survey question:

‍“On a scale from 0–10, how likely are you to recommend our product, service, or brand to a friend or colleague?”

‍Customers fall into three groups based on their answers:

• Promoters (9–10): They love your brand and are your most satisfied customers.
• Passives (7–8): They feel neutral but aren’t excited about your offerings.
• Detractors (0–6): They are dissatisfied and may discourage others from engaging with you.

When businesses review their NPS, the results don’t always meet expectations. So, what could be holding it back?

Here are some factors that may lower your NPS:

• Slow or no follow-up: Ignoring customer feedback, especially from detractors, harms your score. When unhappy customers take the time to share their thoughts, they expect action. If you don’t address their concerns, they may leave and share their frustration elsewhere.
• Product or service issues: If your offering doesn’t meet customer expectations or falls behind industry standards, it impacts your score. For example, frequent inventory shortages compared to competitors will be reflected in your NPS.
• Poor survey design: Your approach to surveys matters. Long, complicated surveys or using channels your customers don’t prefer leads to low-quality data. Asking clear and concise questions at the right time is critical.
• Lack of progress tracking: Without tracking NPS trends over time, it’s hard to identify problems or improvements. Regular monitoring helps you find patterns and root causes affecting your score.
• No organizational support: Improving NPS requires buy-in from everyone in your company. If leadership and teams don’t share the same goals or understand their roles, it becomes very difficult to achieve these positive changes.

Understanding these factors can help you focus on actionable improvements and move your NPS in the right direction.

How to Improve Your NPS Score: 12 Different Ways

Let’s take a look at the 12 different strategies you can use to increase NPS and get a high response rate for your surveys.

1. Ask the right questions in your surveys

The net promoter system works well because it focuses on the core NPS question. However, just asking that question may not give you all the insights.

You must include a driver question to understand why customers gave a particular score. In addition to that, you must ask:

• The customer’s age, interest, or occupation to better understand your audience
• How they would like you to improve. This will help you close the loop and give customers a voice in your business development.

In any case, you shouldn’t ask more than six questions, as it could harm your response rate.You can also segment your driver data to focus on specific issues. This shows customers that you listen and use their feedback to improve your business. 

2. Use cascading questions

Cascading questions provide more specific details as they ask new questions based on previous answers.When you ask cascading questions, you can:

• Increase response rates
• Provide a simpler, personalized experience for customers
• Analyze drivers and sub-drivers

Moreover, it reduces the need for complex text analytics and simplifies survey logic.

They help you gather more profound customer thoughts while creating a better survey experience.

3. Increase response rates

A higher response rate leads to more accurate NPS results, which improves your CX program.

In fact, customers who love your brand are more likely to respond to surveys. Low response rates may mean false positives, which can give you inaccurate feedback.

To boost your NPS, you can focus on increasing your response rate. Here’s how:

• Be clear about survey expectations. That is, you need to prioritize your time and what customers get in return.
• Clean your contact lists regularly for better response rates.
• Send surveys at the right time. Studies indicate that response rates are higher at the beginning of a workweek and tend to slow down on Fridays. For optimum results, you can send your survey anywhere between 1 a.m. and 7 a.m., with responses peaking at 4 AM.

4. Optimize survey frequency

Customers don’t want to be overburdened or frustrated with constant survey requests.

Timing matters when sending surveys, and customers may expect them more often than you think.

So, for B2B relationships, you can survey your customers every quarter. For customer service, send an NPS survey 10 minutes after you resolve an issue. Lastly, for e-commerce, send a survey a week after the purchase to allow product testing.

This shows that sending them surveys at the right time boosts response rates.

When you optimize survey frequency, you can improve your NPS score.

5. Don’t forget about passives and non-respondents 

Focusing solely on Detractors and Promoters might seem like a smart strategy, but it can lead to a skewed NPS score. While addressing contractors is crucial, don’t ignore the importance of engaging with passive and non-responsive respondents.

Fred Reichheld, the creator of NPS, advises treating Non-Respondents as Detractors and keeping Passives on your radar. After all, silence isn’t golden—it’s often a red flag.

Monitoring feedback (or the lack of it) from all groups provides a clearer picture of customer health and helps you address potential risks effectively.

6. Choose the right channels to send surveys

Your survey response rate depends on how you deliver the NPS survey. While most businesses use email, other methods may work better. For example, ClearlyRated allows you to send NPS surveys via email, SMS, WhatsApp, pop-ups, or phone calls.

Over time, find the channels that work best for you and your customers.

Part Two: Improve NPS with Benchmarking

With your survey process optimized, it's time to dive into your results. The strategies outlined below will help you gain deeper insights into your NPS.

7. Study your competition

An NPS score on its own doesn't tell the whole story—it needs context to deliver real value. You can start by studying your competitors well. As we’ve mentioned before, customer experience can make or break a business, even before your product or price. So, understanding and optimizing your NPS begins with knowing how your competitors are performing.

Ask yourself questions like:

• What’s their service like? 
• How do they handle customer experience? 
• What can you do better?

These questions can help you understand your position and plan improvements.‍

More than half of CX executives use NPS, so it’s necessary to stay informed.

8. Benchmark your progress

One of the most critical pieces of data you can use to compare how well your brand performs is your past scores. Additionally, your past NPS acts as a foundation for future goals. Then, you can regularly measure customer satisfaction rates to monitor progress.

Customer experience tools such as ClearlyRated can help you track progress monthly or quarterly.

9. Act on  customer feedback

Next, it’s essential to close the loop—take action on customer feedback and let them know you’re taking it seriously. It shows customers you value their input and can help you drive better NPS scores.

Research suggests that U.S. businesses lose $136 billion annually due to customer churn costs. In fact, solving customer problems during the first interaction could reduce the churn rate by 67%.

When you act on feedback, customers feel heard, and satisfaction improves. It also turns Passives into Promoters and improves your processes.Here’s the thing:  Many companies collect feedback, but only a few act on it and inform their customers.

10. Carry out a root cause analysis 

Now, when you get back to your customers on their feedback and improve your services, it also helps identify the root cause of the issue. It digs into minor problems to find the trigger behind customer pain points.

You can use the 'Five Whys' technique to uncover underlying problems. For example, when you see the problem,  ask why that has happened. Then, ask why that is the case. Then, ask “Why?” three more times to explore the issue deeply. And that’s how each answer forms the basis of the next question.

You can dive into the root cause through focus groups or collaborative team discussions.

11. Tie your NPS to revenue

The next step is to tie your NPS to revenue. This means you need to compare your financial data with the Promoters, Passives, and Detractors. By doing this, you can:

• Identify revenue at risk
• Prioritize key customer experience areas
• Find opportunities for growth

When you connect CX to revenue, you can make better decisions, gain executive support, and identify opportunities to reduce churn.

In addition to driving operational improvements, NPS can also play a key role in branding. For example, Apex Systems partnered with ClearlyRated to utilize their Amplify Recruiters program. As part of the program, Apex's recruiters earned personalized, verified profiles that allowed them to showcase positive reviews and testimonials from candidates, helping to overcome skepticism and build trust.

The success of this program was so impactful that Apex purchased 250 Amplify Recruiters licenses, expanding the initiative across their organization. Apex Systems grew significantly, ranking 2nd among the top 10 staffing firms in North America while maintaining strong NPS scores from both clients and talent.

12. Get buy-in across your organization

If you're struggling to gain support for NPS, start by showing its value to each department. Your NPS will only improve if the whole company believes in it, especially management.

Your customer experience strategy must be customer-focused and employee-focused. When NPS becomes part of your company's culture, it thrives.

Note that CX should involve everyone, from the CEO to frontline staff, not just the customer service team.

Track Your Progress

Tracking your NPS helps you see if your customer experience efforts work. It gives you data to make better decisions. 

Here's how to track your NPS:

Set clear benchmarks

‍ClearlyRated’s 2023 NPS Benchmark for Accounting study shows the accounting industry has steadily improved over the past few years. After hitting a low point in the late 2010s, the industry’s NPS surged by 15% in 2021, marking a major turnaround. 

In 2022, the trend continued with a 1% increase, followed by another 2% rise in 2023, bringing the industry average to 41% (its highest level since 2011).

Setting clear benchmarks for your NPS score lets you know what a good score is. Without a benchmark, you won’t know if your NPS is improving, declining, or steady.

Monitor NPS over time

Next, you should monitor your NPS periodically (e.g., monthly or quarterly) to identify patterns in customer sentiment. For example, if there’s a sudden drop in your score, it directs you to an issue you need to fix quickly. 

Over time, this gives you insight into the impact of your changes.

Segment analysis

Segment your NPS data to understand customer groups better. Divide your customers into Promoters, Passives, and Detractors. This helps you find which groups are happy and which need attention. 

You can further segment the data by product, location, or other factors. This lets you dig deeper into specific pain points, and you can focus your efforts on that particular issue.

Industry comparisons

Compare your NPS to industry standards. See how your score stacks up against competitors. If your NPS is below the industry average, find ways to improve. If it’s above average, you are performing well. 

Take the IT services industry, for example. According to the 2023 study by ClearlyRated, an NPS of 42% was recorded, hinting at a slight drop from 2022 but maintaining the strong momentum the industry has built over the years.

In 2021, the industry saw a notable rise, reaching 42% (a major improvement from its 2020 score of 38%). In 2022, the industry hit an all-time high before dipping slightly in 2023, but it remains well above historical averages.

Despite this progress, IT Services firms still have room for improvement compared to global benchmarks, where a 50% NPS is considered excellent, and 70% + is world-class. Service leaders like Starbucks (77%) and USAA (75%) set the bar for customer satisfaction. Conversely, brands like Comcast score poorly with a -25% NPS.

This presents both a challenge and an opportunity for all service providers. As client expectations continue to evolve, firms that fail to keep up will struggle, while those that build on their NPS methodology will gain a competitive edge. 

How to Improve Your NPS with ClearlyRated

If you’re looking for robust  NPS software to boost your response rates, ClearlyRated might be just what you need!

ClearlyRated is a client feedback and reputation management platform designed specifically for professional service firms, including those in the staffing, accounting, legal, and consulting industries.

The platform offers benchmarking backed by over a decade of data, helping businesses compare their scores against industry standards and identify key pain points. Additionally, it enables them to gather, analyze, and leverage client feedback through customizable surveys and NPS metrics.

ClearlyRated’s analytical capabilities provide real-time insights into customer satisfaction, empowering businesses to refine their survey processes. After collecting feedback, users can take proactive, data-driven actions using the platform’s intuitive self-service tools.

While a dedicated ClearlyRated Customer Success Manager is available for guidance and support, the focus on self-service allows users to efficiently address churn risks and tackle critical issues on their own. 

Finally, its one-click integrations eliminate manual data entry and enable real-time feedback synchronization across platforms.If improving your NPS is a priority, now’s the perfect time—why not book a free demo with ClearlyRated today?