Fred says the score is dead – stop being score whores and DO something with the data already!

Okay – I’m paraphrasing. I just returned from the third annual Satmetrix NPS Conference. This one was in San Francisco and included such speakers as the CEOs of Charles Schwab, Intuit, Logitech and my favorite, Zappos.com. It also included Tammy Gallegos from America First Credit Union and Diana Dykstra, San Francisco Fire Credit Union.

This conference is two days of non-stop sessions designed to push your brain into another realm. They don’t give you a giant notebook full of power point presentations, but rather a pad of paper in a nice leather portfolio and a pen. Take notes!

Here are my favorite notes from the sessions I attended:

Charles Schwab CEO, Walter Bettinger II:

Financial institutions are the king of “gotcha” fees!

Do not give a great deal to a new (unknown) client if you can’t offer the same deal to an existing (loyal) client!

Bad data leads to bad decisions.

Servant leaders breed a customer-centric culture.

Richard Owen, CEO of Satmetrix:

Flat is the new UP!

The economics of customers acquisition is changing. It’s lots harder to acquire new customers, so you better not lose the ones you have!
Word-of-mouth has always been the Holy Grail and is trusted 78% of the time.
Let your customers market FOR you!

ZAPPOS.com CEL Tony Hsieh:

Retention is the new Acquisition!

We are a service company that happens to sell shoes, clothing, handbags, etc.

75% of our business comes form repeat customers.

Take the money they would have spent on marketing and put it into the customer experience and let them market FOR us!

Whatever you’re thinking – think BIGGER!

Chase the vision, not the money.

and finally

Fred Reichheld, author of The Ultimate Question and co-author of the Net Promoter Score:

The only way you can afford to grow in tough times is through referral.

A promoter is worth 3X more than a detractor.

BUT, who do we care most about to learn from? Which customers should you listen to? NPS is a conversation, not a survey. Who cares what your score is, what are you DOING with the data (verbatims) you receive?

You need to get your CFO involved. Accounting systems have not caught up with NPS.

My take: This is the third year NPS practitioners from around the world have gathered and I’ve seen a distinct shift from, how to gather good data and how does your score compare in the industry to “screw the score” if you’re not listening to the RIGHT customers and making the RIGHT decisions (hard decisions) to improve your service to them, you’re toast.

Retention today is everything – stop wasting money on membership bribes and the spray and pray approach to marketing. We need new tools in this economy – the DISCIPLINE of NPS is the right tool for the right job.