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There are a variety of metrics used to track guest satisfaction, but one stands out in terms of its prevalence - the Net Promoter Score, or NPS.
What is the NPS? Technically, it's a calculation based on measured guest satisfaction, rather than a measure itself. We're all familiar with the 'How likely are you to recommend to your friends?' question. What the NPS tries to do is to see, on average, what proportion of your guests are likely to be talking positively about their experience with you. This indicates whether they're likely to return, and whether they're likely to encourage friends and family to do the same.
The NPS is calculated by taking the percentage of guests with a 'recommend' rating of 9 or 10, and subtracting the percentage with a rating of 6 or below. The principle is that by measuring the difference between the number of people actively promoting you and the number saying you're a bit rubbish, you get a 'net' value of promoters.
The appeal of NPS is its simplicity. It's an easy question to ask. Because it's become quite widespread, it is also very familiar, even across different industries.
It's not, however, without criticism. To get a net score, you need a decent sample size, so it's generally not worth calculating when you have fewer than about 20 recommend ratings. In addition, people often forget about the 'passives' - the people giving a recommend rating of 7 or 8. If this segment is large, then it probably means you're not very interesting - people don't have much to say, positive or negative. As success often depends on how front-of-mind you are, this can be almost as damaging as people speaking negatively.
Another common criticism of NPS is that it's a blunt measure, telling you nothing about what's influencing your score. To combat this, combine your NPS with other more qualitative feedback to measure the 4 Ps of Guest Experience Management: People, Process, Product, Perception. When you can drill down from the headline statistic to more detailed descriptions, you'll better understand what lies behind the NPS. This additional data informs the actions you and your team can take to drive up the NPS, and ultimately get more guests through the doors.
