NPS Industry Benchmarks
Written by Support EXP
What’s an effective way to measure your customer experience?
Enter the Net Promoter Score (NPS)®, a customer loyalty metric designed to give you a broad understanding of how customers see your business.
When companies use the NPS, they’re often tempted to jump right to the statistics: what score on the NPS is the best? How can I get my score as high as possible?
While these questions can be helpful, it’s best to understand what the benchmark scores mean, what drives high and low scores, and how you can use the NPS to improve long-term customer loyalty and refine your customer experience.
In this article, we’re addressing NPS industry benchmarks—typical rankings, goals to strive for, and factors to consider when using the NPS as a customer loyalty measurement tool.
Key Takeaways:
- A score of 50+ is excellent, but scores from 20-30 will also indicate happy customers.
- Evaluate how your NPS measures up against other leaders in your industry.
- NPS benchmarks are a great place to start, but be sure to incorporate other metrics as well.
Why NPS Matters and How to Do Benchmarking
First thing’s first: why does the NPS even matter? At its core, the NPS is important because it gives companies a tool to understand customer sentiment, get ongoing feedback, and conduct more focused research to increase customer loyalty and provide better service for the consumer. Once you’ve collected your net promoter score, you can then proceed to benchmarking. In this stage, you look at industry NPS for other similar companies across your sector of service. Once you’ve compared results, you can develop net promoter score benchmarks – attainable goals to improve your scores and create happier customers.
Your net promoter score benchmark might take a variety of forms. You could set a range of scores that you’d be satisfied with, or you could pick a specific industry average that you’d like to exceed. Keep in mind that your NPS benchmarks can (and should) change as you work toward your goals with the survey. As your average net promoter score increases, you can examine feedback to create a new goal that reflects your NPS progress.
What Are Good NPS Benchmarks
What is a good benchmark score for NPS?
As a general rule of thumb, a score above 50 is excellent. If you can crack 70, you’re most likely an elite, customer-centric company. Only a small handful of companies can maintain this high level of excellence.
On the other hand, a surveys score in the 20s and 30s is a good NPS score that indicates generally happy customers.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, an NPS below 0 is cause for serious concern. It’s a warning that customer satisfaction is dangerously low.
Treat a score on this level as a wake-up call to focus on customer experience and identify friction points that might be dragging down your NPS rating with customers.
When you’re determining a good NPS benchmark for your business, it’s important to keep in mind trends over time. The average NPS value has decreased slightly over the years due to increased competition across industries.
In today’s business world, it’s more challenging to stand out in a growing field.
Pitfalls to Avoid When Evaluating NPS
Another important thing to keep in mind when evaluating NPS benchmarks is to avoid chasing vanity metrics. It can be tempting to see a high net promoter score as a status symbol and solidly focus all your efforts on getting a 50.
However, it is better to focus on short-term NPS wins that will have a significant impact on your business. For example, if your current NPS is a -5, just getting up to a 10 is a major victory that indicates a big shift in customer satisfaction.
In other words, beware of setting sky-high NPS goals that don’t reflect realistic scenarios. It’s better to focus on the little wins, ones that show steady progress and customers who are increasingly happy with your services based on your surveys.
Lastly, when you’re developing an NPS goal, keep in mind that the score is ultimately just a number.
It’s not a comprehensive picture of your customer loyalty, and it isn’t a substitute for a holistic customer experience strategy.
Rather, think of it as one tool among many in your arsenal, a launching point to help you understand where you are and where you need to be.
Use the NPS as a guide and standard to strive for, but keep it realistic and remember to look at the big picture.
What Is a Good NPS Score per Industry?
When analyzing your NPS, it can be tempting to compare your score from surveys with other companies across industries.
If you’ve worked hard for a 40, you might look at a company with NPS in the 70s and wonder what you’re doing wrong.
Comparison within your industry can be a helpful way to gauge how your company performs when it comes to loyalty, but don’t look too far afield when finding a standard net promoter score.
Cross-industry comparisons often do not have much parity, as some industries are more polarizing to the customer. A good net promoter score in insurance, for instance, might be a terrible net promoter score for a software company.
A more effective strategy is to look at how your NPS stacks up with other leaders in your industry.
Average Net Promoter Score by Industries
The net promoter NPS varies widely across companies. Survey results consistently indicate that some companies simply perform better on the NPS. Given this information, NPS benchmarks look very different from one industry to another. Below are some common industries and their general NPS. Note that other factors like company size, age, customer base, and overall CX performance also affect NPS.
Benchmarks for auto dealers, software and computer companies, and appliance providers tend to have higher industry averages, hovering in the low 40s for net promoter score.
At the other end of the net promoter score spectrum, utility companies, TV and internet services, and health plan providers tend to have industry averages in the teens and low 20s. Of special note: many companies have seen a marked decrease in NPS since the start of the pandemic. If this is happening to you, don’t panic! You can still deliver for the customer and focus on good service and a positive brand experience.
Another factor to consider when looking at your NPS is whether your company operates on a B2B or B2C model. A 2022 survey from Retently found that B2B companies get scores in the 25 to 68 range. In contrast, the survey found that companies with B2C services ranged from 4 to 71. The wider gap in the B2C group is a reminder that companies selling directly to the customer have a more difficult and volatile job. Moreover, depending on your business model, you may get wildly different feedback from survey to survey. One customer might live your services, while another couldn’t be more unhappy.
A final factor to consider when looking at your NPS is your company size. A high NPS within your industry is often a predictor of growth: according to a survey conducted by Bain & Company, the NPS leader in a given industry grew over two times faster than its direct competitors. If you’re looking to increase the size of your business, you don’t need to have the highest NPS ever. You simply need to have the highest NPS in your industry.
The bottom line? When you’re looking at your own NPS, you should strive for excellence within your industry by understanding how your direct competitors are faring when it comes to customer loyalty. By pursuing a high NPS relative to your direct competitors, you set realistic survey goals and set yourself up for growth.
Should You Rely on Net Promoter Score Benchmarks to Determine a Good NPS?
You should steer clear of drawing firm conclusions from Net Promoter Scores and surveys outside your industry or specialty. While these numbers are helpful, they may not apply to your corner of the market.
There’s really only one NPS rule of thumb that applies across industries: if a report shows your NPS below 0, that’s cause for alarm. Across the board, a negative NPS is bad news. However, once you’ve reached the positives, there’s no silver-bullet NPS that proves you’ll experience customer retention.
On the other hand, when you’re looking for management solutions to improve your NPS score, the average for brands similar to yours is a valuable tool to help you set goals for your service or product. If you can get more happy customers than your direct competitors, you’ll see results as more customers look for your services.
The NPS is just a number. What gives your NPS actual meaning is the context: your industry, your business’s strong and weak areas, and how your customers feel at the end of their journey.
Use NPS industry benchmarks as a starting point, but don’t treat them as infallible rules that must guide your business practices.
Don’t relentlessly chase a higher NPS simply as a “vanity metric.” Instead, use your results to help you analyze what your business is doing well and where you can improve customer experience and loyalty.
When you do this, you’ll be able to improve the tangible benefits that keep customers coming back, time after time.
Do you need help evaluating your NPS score? Support EXP can help.
Have More Questions? Reach Out to Our Team Of Experts
Net Promoter®, NPS®, NPS Prism®, and the NPS-related emoticons are registered trademarks of Bain & Company, Inc., Satmetrix Systems, Inc., and Fred Reichheld.