BENCHMARKS

Technology

2020 B2B Benchmarks

1. Study Overview

Net Promoter Score®, or NPS®, has a 20-year track record as a proven leading indicator of revenue growth. It is widely acknowledged as the most effective overall metric for managing customer experience. As a measure of loyalty to a brand and of the overall experience customers have with a company, NPS offers a simple, powerful metric proven to correlate with economic outcomes. For that reason, it’s the best metric to anchor comprehensive efforts to improve the customer experience and therefore the bottom line.

 

When combined with a comprehensive analysis of the drivers of the customer relationship and of various customer touchpoints, NPS provides unparalleled insight. Companies can use an understanding of their NPS and related customer experience metrics to drive long-term and strategic planning and to demonstrate the effectiveness of their customer experience improvements over time.

 

As a benchmark across competitive companies and industries, NPS provides insight into relative company performance and variations in customer experience. NICE Satmetrix reports, presented here, include information about the attributes that drive customer loyalty so that you can look beyond the score itself into the factors that influence the customer experience. NPS benchmarks give you a critical tool for evaluating your own company’s performance in the competitive landscape.

 

Net Promoter Score (NPS)

Net Promoter® is a proven loyalty metric central to methodology for using customer feedback to fuel profitable growth. Developed by Satmetrix, Bain & Company, and Fred Reichheld in 2003, the concept has since been embraced by leading companies worldwide as the standard for measuring and improving customer loyalty.

 

Net Promoter Score®, or NPS®, is a loyalty metric calculated by placing a company’s customers into three categories: Promoters, Passives, and Detractors. Customers are asked this key loyalty question: “How likely is it that you would recommend [Company X or Brand X] to a friend or colleague?” Customers respond using a 0-to-10 point rating scale, where 0 represents “not at all likely,” 5 represents “neutral,” and 10 represents “extremely likely” to recommend. Responses are categorized as follows:

 

  • Promoters (score 9-10) are loyal enthusiasts who will keep buying and refer others, fueling growth.
  • Passives (score 7-8) are satisfied but unenthusiastic customers who are vulnerable to competitive offerings.
  • Detractors (score 0-6) are unhappy customers who can damage your brand and impede growth through negative word-of-mouth.

 

To calculate an industry’s Net Promoter Score, take the percentage of customers who are Promoters and subtract the percentage who are Detractors. The resulting NPS, which can range from -100 to 100, provides insight on overall region-level performance, as well as competitive position among companies within a given region. By understanding attributes of the customer experience that influence the recommend score and NPS, companies can make improvements to product/service design and delivery to support profitable growth.

The Net Promoter Score was jointly developed by Satmetrix and Fred Reichheld based on research using three years of data. Results were first published in 2003. Net Promoter Score, Net Promoter, and NPS are trademarks of NICE Systems, Inc., Bain and Company, Inc., and Fred Reichheld.

 

For more information on Net Promoter and the data collection methodology, please refer to the Appendix.

2. Interactive Charts

This section features customer experience performance benchmarks for the entire industry. The charts are interactive, so you can click on the filter icon and filter further by segments such as:

  • Industry
  • Region
  • Purchase influence
  • And even by response to a survey question

 

This section shows scores for Net Promoter, Customer Effort, Customer Satisfaction, and other industry-level metrics.

2.1 Net Promoter Score (NPS) Performance

 

This section displays benchmark NPS performance for the current year, and by a handful of other demographic categories (e.g. region, purchase influence level, and customer tenure). Furthermore, the interactive chart features are designed to help you understand statistically significant comparison in NPS performance, using 95% confidence intervals.


2.1.1 NPS Promoter by Region

 

2.1.2 NPS by Purchase Influence

 

2.1.3 NPS by Tenure

 

2.2 Customer Effort Score Performance

 

2.3 Customer Satisfaction Performance

This section features comprehensive benchmarks on customer journey attributes common to all industries and attributes specific to this industry. We asked customers to rate their satisfaction with each attribute using a 0-to-10 point scale, where 0 represents not at all satisfied, 5 represents neutral, and 10 represents extremely satisfied.

Furthermore, we evaluated the relative impact of each customer journey attribute by analyzing the correlation between its customer satisfaction score and ‘Likelihood to Recommend’. This analysis can be found in a separate tab on the right of your browser and should be used to help prioritize company initiatives.

How to Interpret the Driver Charts

Use this chart to prioritize performance improvement initiatives.

This chart represents the association between customer satisfaction (explanatory variable, plotted along the x-axis) and the correlation coefficient between customer satisfaction and ‘Likelihood to Recommend’ (response variable, plotted along the y-axis). The correlation coefficient measures the strength of association between the two variables and ranges from -1 to +1, where the strength increases the closer the coefficient is to either end of the spectrum (i.e. -1 and +1).

An attribute’s relative position on the chart indicates one of four actions (clockwise from top left):

  • Prioritize (top left) – Attributes in this quadrant represent immediate priorities based on their relatively high impact on ‘Likelihood to Recommend’ and low customer satisfaction scores.
  • Leverage (top right) – Attributes in this quadrant can be exploited to drive greater customer loyalty given their relatively high scores in both ‘Likelihood to Recommend’ and customer satisfaction.
  • Maintain (bottom right) – Attributes in this quadrant should be maintained at current performance levels given the relative positioning on ‘Likelihood to Recommend’ and customer satisfaction.
  • Improve (bottom left) – Attributes in this quadrant should be viewed as the lowest priorities given their relatively low positioning in both ‘Likelihood to Recommend’ and customer satisfaction.

Each dot represents a specific attribute and the color of the dot indicates a satisfaction level based on average satisfaction scores.

  • Dissatisfied (Red): Average satisfaction is less than 5
  • Neutral (Yellow): Average satisfaction is greater than or equal to 5 and less than or equal to 8.5
  • Satisfied (Green): Average satisfaction is greater than 8.5
  • Insufficient Data (Gray): Fewer than 25 respondents answered this question. We recommend waiting until you have more data before drawing conclusions from this data point.

2.3.1 Satisfaction Levels by Relationship Attribute

 

2.3.2 Drivers of Likelihood to Recommend

 

2.3.3 Satisfaction Levels for Industry Specific Relationship Drivers

 

2.3.4 Industry-Specific Drivers

 

2.4. Recommend Comments

 

The Word Cloud chart is valuable for uncovering emerging trends respondents may be talking about for this industry. It lists the most frequently used words by respondents in response to the question “What is the primary reason for the recommendation score you just gave?” The most frequently used words are displayed in larger text.

 

The table below displays the Recommend scores and comments for this industry. Comments originally written in other languages have been translated into English.

 

 

3. Appendix

3.1 Data Collection Methodology

The NICE Satmetrix Net Promoter benchmark database is populated with valid, statistically meaningful data that companies can use to compare their performance against others within and across industry sectors.

 

Data is collected through an opt-in email survey sent to business decision-makers or major influencers 18 and over who had previously indicated interest in participating in similar studies, and who have either full decision-making ability on their company’s choice of vendors, or major influence in that decision. An email invitation explains the purpose of the survey, offers an incentive to participate, and provides a link that allows individuals to complete the survey online. Research for the 2020 study was conducted during May of 2020.

 

All respondents are familiar with the industries that are the subject of the survey. Respondent screening and qualification is based on two levels of questioning. Examples of the screening questions are shown below:

 

Decision-making Ability
Respondents are asked: “At your current role in your company, what is your level of involvement when your company decides on which supplier, vendor, contractor, or manufacturer to use to conduct your normal business operations.” In order to qualify for this survey, they must have selected “Major influence, although no/minor decision-making ability”, “Major decision-making ability”, or “Complete decision-making ability”.

 

Sector Experience

  • Respondents are presented with a list of industries, and are then asked to “please select the PRIMARY industries of the major suppliers, vendors, contractors, or manufacturers your company employs.” Respondents are presented with the industries in this benchmark, plus additional real-world industries. Those who select an industry from the ones in the benchmark then move to the final stage of qualification for that industry.

 

Primary Providers

  • For the purposes of this study, respondents are asked to rate their PRIMARY provider within that industry. It is possible that in certain industries, companies reasonably have multiple providers. In these cases, respondents were instructed to rate their PRIMARY provider.
  • Primary provider is defined as the vendor they spent the most money with in the 2019 calendar year.

 

Results are compiled shortly after each study’s completion.

3.2 Internal vs. External Net Promoter Data Collection

There is a difference between internal Net Promoter data (i.e., Net Promoter data collected by a company canvassing its current customer base) and external Net Promoter data (i.e., Net Promoter data collected by a third party using third party respondents). The expected difference results from varying respondent samples.

 

Internally collected Net Promoter data is generated through a process by which companies measure customer experience with the goal of improving loyalty and Net Promoter Scores. Respondents in the sample come from the company’s current customer base. Data, including Net Promoter Scores, are used within the company to understand how teams, regions, products, business units, and market segments are performing, and to drive closed- loop follow up action and customer experience improvements.

 

External data, as provided in this report, provide a snapshot of each company’s market reputation for comparative purposes. Respondents in the sample include business decision-makers or major influencers who have either direct control or major impact on their choice of B2B vendors.

3.3 Creating Custom Reports

 

NICE Satmetrix is available to create custom benchmark reports, which may leverage existing data or original research. Contact us for information and pricing.

3.4 About NICE Satmetrix

 

NICE Satmetrix is the leading global provider of customer experience management software for companies who know that customer experience drives success. Our flagship product, NICE Satmetrix, delivers powerful, cost-effective customer experience management in a complete, always-on SaaS solution. The world’s most forward-thinking companies choose NICE Satmetrix to help them build and manage customer experience programs that deliver bottom-line results.
 
NICE Satmetrix had been advancing the field of customer experience through software, data, and expertise for more than 19 years. We co-created the Net Promoter Score®, the most respected measure of customer experience and only proven predictor of growth. We have spent the years since its introduction in 2003 refining and battle-testing best practices for improving the customer experience; our software puts our expertise into practice.
 
NICE Satmetrix draws on our ever-growing database of CX performance data – the world’s largest – to help guide the best practices built into our software and delivered through our customer success teams and our training courses.
 
We are a part of NICE (Nasdaq:NICE), the worldwide leading provider of both cloud and on-premises enterprise software solutions, helping organizations of all sizes deliver better customer service, ensure compliance, combat fraud and safeguard citizens. Over 25,000 organizations in more than 150 countries, including over 85 of the Fortune 100 companies, are using NICE solutions. For more about NICE, visit www.nice.com.

4. Legal

 

Trademarks

Satmetrix is a trademark of NICE Systems Inc.. Net Promoter Score, Net Promoter, and NPS are trademarks of NICE Systems, Inc., Bain and Company, Inc., and Fred Reichheld. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

 

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