This week I received the ‘fresh from the press’ 2010 report from MarketResponse for the most customer friendly company in the Netherlands.  This was the 4th consecutive year for this research and I was truly interested in what new discoveries it would hold.  The report begins with a high level summary of the results; industry wide the average was 7.66 (out of 10) for customer friendliness.  Telecom (includes triple play providers) organizations scoring the lowest with 7.19 and home shopping stores the highest with 8.02. No big surprises there as the customer frustrations with the telecom industry are known and readily available for your viewing pleasure on programs such as Radar, and more recently Twitter (i.e. Youp).  What was surprising to me was that they scored 7.19.  Considering that everyone I know in my personal network can tell their own horrifying customer service story with a Telecom company I was expecting an overall lower score than 7.

My surprise was taken away when reading about the comparison made between the customer friendliness score and NPS.  Here is the ‘true’ picture of how things are really going in the Netherlands marketplace in terms of customer service.  The graph shown clearly displays the majority of companies having a negative NPS score.

Even a few companies with a score of 8 for customer friendliness do not have a positive NPS.  Here is in essence the key; just because you are friendly to customers doesn’t mean they will recommend your products and services to others. With a NPS adoption wave running through many organizations in the Netherlands it is important to realize that by taking on this new metric organizations are in essence raising the bar for themselves.  Organization have for years measured customer satisfaction but likely were satisfied with a score of 7. The NPS measurement doesn’t give any credits for a 7.  As average service is just that; average.

To have a positive, and double digit, NPS score organizations need to provide excellent customer service.  Don’t just meet the customers expectations but exceed them. Give them something to tell their friends about via Twitter.  Excellence in customer service requires organizations to open up and have a dialogue with the customer. One way service is no longer acceptable; customers want to be heard and involved in the discussion to find solutions.  This years #1 customer friendly company; Landal Greenparks, says it best: “een noreply@landal.nl is uit den boze”.

Creating and maintaining promoters for your organization requires dedicating your organizations efforts to providing a true customer centric experience.  Don’t settle for an average 7 when you can be a 10!

For inspiring ideas on how to adopt a customer centric approach to your organization visit: http://tinyurl.com/365xzg5