How often should NPS Survey's be sent out?

Deepak Verma

Hi,

My team is reviewing options to update the implementation of our NPS program. The aim will be to keep up to date on the current sentiment of the customer. If they are a promoter we want to better understand why they enjoy working with us, and if they are passive or detractor we plan on adding a follow-up question to better understand what improvements they'd like to see.

What I'm looking for help with is:
1. How often should a survey be sent out (i.e. every 90 days, or immediately after key events like QBRs, Kick-offs, Go-Lives, etc..)
2. Should the frequency change based on the recipient i.e. main day to day contacts vs. executive sponsors

Thanks!

Jeff Heckler

Hi Deepak,

1. NPS: These are very generic overall sentiment and feedback channel.  In my roles, we have sent them out at the 3- and 9- month stages of our customers' tenure for strategic reasons.

2.  immediately after key events like QBRs, Kick-offs, Go-Lives, etc.: These should have their own feedback surveys since they pertain, or are at least timed, with certain events.

Thanks,

Jeff

Jeff Heckler

MarketSource

jheckler@marketsource.com 

Brooke Carrie

Great question! I am getting ready to launch our NPS program next week. I decided on sending out the survey every 6 months. 
I also have it in our backlog to have IT work on developing it so it pop-ups in our application every 3-6 months, with the intention that if they have filled it out recently then it won't pop-up for 6 months. 

Next on my to do list is to set up CSAT survey's which will be trigger based, based on particular events that the customers go through (e.g., finish onboarding, send in a support ticket, etc).

Ed Powers

If your goal is to improve your product and processes, then NPS is the wrong tool. It's a place to start if you have nothing else, but it's not diagnostic. 

I suggest you first write down specifically what you'd like to learn, generate questions, and collect qualitative data from the segments and personas of interest. You will see patterns emerge, and it will help you focus on asking more relevant questions in a quantitative CSAT, as @Jeff Heckler describes.

In quantitative surveys, sampling space, frequency, and number of samples are determined by survey design. For example, to estimate a mean of a population from a representative sample, a minimum sample size of 30 is recommended to achieve 80% power. Detecting differences between populations requires many more, depending on the desired confidence level, the size of the effect, the distributions, and the standard deviations. Then sample size, accuracy, speed of change, cost and effort all affect choices about frequency.

Carl Hoffmann

Hi Deepak - 

We sent out annual questionnaires that had a smaller version as a follow-up 6 months later.  We divided the customer base by 12 months to balance the data load and had governance in place to prevent sending them near renewal time.  That seemed to work well, but I think it's OK to gauge what works for you and your customer base best.  I think the more important part is making sure it gets to the right contacts by maintaining an updated list to ensure good data (GIGO!).

If @Steve Bernstein is around, he might have some good thoughts on this, too.

Katie Yagodnik

Hi Deepak,

1. In my experience best practice for an NPS is to survey 1/6 of your customer base 1X a month and every 6-months.  You have to make sure your team and your organization can handle all of the feedback and take action so too frequently deploying your NPS can get overwhelming. 

2. I don't think frequency necessarily needs to change by contact role. I would use those roles internally post NPS participation to analyze, draw conclusions and create the next steps for the team.  

I read a great book recently by Maurice Fitzgerald B.E. called Net Promoter. Switzerland, 2019.

Also, here are some additional resources:https://blog.totango.com/2019/11/using-customer-satisfaction-metrics-nps-best-practices-fc/ 

Take Care,
Katie Yagodnik
Director Digital Programs and Operations 
Totango

Sean Wilkes

We're delivering survey on a rolling basis in-app and collate every 6 months.  Anyone who is flagged as a key contact and hasn't responded in-app is sent an email every 6 months ahead of that half yearly collation.

Deepak Verma

Thank you to everyone for responding. There are a lot of great suggestions here that I will be reviewing with me team. 

@Katie Yagodnik and @Carl Hoffmann good point on spreading this out so we aren't overloaded with feedback and can't take action quickly enough. @Jeff Heckler agree that key events should have their own feedback surveys.