CEOs regularly announce ambitious growth targets, then fail to achieve
them. The reason? Too many companies are addicted to bad profits. These
corporate steroids boost short-term earnings but burn out the employees
and alienate customers. They undermine growth by creating legions of
detractors--customers who sully the firm's reputation and switch to
competitors at the earliest opportunity.
Now loyalty expert Fred Reichheld shows how to reverse the equation,
turning customers into promoters who generate good profits and true,
sustainable growth. The key: one simple question--Would you recommend us
to a friend?--that allows companies to track promoters and detractors
and produces a clear measure of an organization's performance in its
customers' eyes.
Analysis shows that on average, increasing the Net Promoter Score (NPS)
by a dozen points versus competitors can double a company's growth rate.
While easy to grasp, this metric represents a radical change in the way
companies manage customer relationships and organize for growth. Rather
than relying on notoriously ineffective customer satisfaction surveys,
companies can use NPS to measure customer relationships as rigorously as
they now measure profits. What's more, NPS finally enables CEOs to hold
employees accountable for treating customers right. It clarifies the
link between the quality of a company's customer relationships and its
growth prospects.
Based on extensive research and rich with vivid examples of
organizations that have pioneered NPS in practice, The Ultimate
Question offers hands-on guidance on how to: Distinguish good profits
from bad; Measure NPS and benchmark performance against world-class
standards; Quantify the economic value generated by customer word of
mouth; Assign accountability for improving customer relationships;
Identify core customers and set priorities for strategic investments;
Move customers beyond mere "satisfaction" to true loyalty; Create
communications of passionate advocates that stimulate innovation and
growth. Practical and compelling, The Ultimate Question will help you
solve your organization's growth dilemma.
