6 Metrics for Assessing Customer Experience: Introduction to CX Analytics

Bonus: free calculators.

You set up processes, monitor product quality, and spend huge amounts on promotion. But sometimes, the customer experience breaks down, rendering all efforts fruitless. Negative reviews flood in, and loyal customers leave. In a highly competitive environment, there's no room for error. That's why it's crucial to monitor customer experience or CX. Let's delve into which metrics will help in this article.

54% of users think that the experience in many companies could be improved. By listening to them, you can make your brand stand out from competitors, strengthen loyalty, and create a flow of 'free' customers who come by recommendation.

Business owners want to provide the best for their customers, but reality often introduces changes. Timely identification of issues and systematic improvement of experience is facilitated by CX analytics.

CX Analytics: Which Metrics to Track The goal of customer experience analytics is to study the potential buyer's journey and identify barriers and weak spots. Based on the data collected, you can build hypotheses and improve CX.

You can analyze hundreds of different indicators, but if you're just starting to explore the topic, these six key ones are sufficient:

1. NPS Net Promoter Score or Consumer Loyalty Index helps assess company loyalty.

The simplest data collection method is a survey. Find out from customers the likelihood on a ten-point scale that they will recommend the brand:

0-6 - probably won't recommend;

7-8 - satisfied with the experience but passive;

9-10 - likely to recommend, your advocates.

Subtract the percentage of responses below 7 from those with 9-10 to get your NPS. It directly affects retention, brand recognition, and customer acquisition cost.

Calculate NPS for free here.

Enter the number of responses for each rating.

2. CSAT Customer Satisfaction Score shows how much your audience likes your product and what areas need improvement.

Ask users how satisfied they are with the service/product/company on a scale of 1 to 10 (or 5). A score of 75-85% is considered good, but there are exceptions in some industries.

Calculate CSAT for free here.

Enter the number of responses for each rating. Adjust the parameters at the bottom right.

3. CES Customer Effort Score indicates how easy or difficult the experience is for users.

Break the journey into small steps and find out how easy each one seemed. A five-point scale is often used:

1 - very easy; 2 - easy;

3 - neither easy nor difficult;

4 - difficult;

5 - very difficult.

The lower the score, the better.

Andrew Schumacher from Gartner notes that CES is 40% more accurate in predicting customer loyalty than the satisfaction index. You can rely on survey responses but also go through the entire journey with the customer and note where their assessment loses objectivity.

Calculate CES for free here.

Enter the number of responses for each rating.

4. Churn Rate Customer churn is a crucial metric. It indicates why users leave and how to bring them back. These losses are costly for businesses.

To calculate the Churn Rate, first select a period for evaluation. At its end, count the number of lost customers. Divide this by the number of customers at the beginning of the period.

The average result is 5-7%. More than 10% is bad, but this varies by industry. For example, in online retail, up to 22% is considered normal.

Calculate the Churn Rate for free here.

Enter the number of customers at the beginning and the number of lost customers.

5. CLV Customer Lifetime Value helps understand how much value a single customer will bring over the entire period of cooperation.

Based on these data, it's easier to decide which target audience the business should attract. Also:

Segment the customer base;

Improve conversion and ROI;

Generate hypotheses about the effectiveness of attracting and retaining customers;

Target only potentially promising TA.

Calculate CLV for free here.

Indicate the average cost of acquiring a customer, retention percentage, and average revenue. For a more accurate estimate, use complex end-to-end analytics tools.

6. CRR Customer Retention Rate informs how successfully you are strengthening audience loyalty. To calculate this metric, you need to know how many customers were there at the beginning and end of the period, and how many newcomers there were. It is closely related to the churn rate but highlights the percentage of users that can be retained.

Calculate CRR for free here.

Specify the number of customers at the end of the period, the number of attracted customers, and the number of customers at the beginning of the period. Start tracking these six metrics. It will be the first step towards the ideal customer experience. They will signal if something goes wrong. Understanding the reasons and eliminating them timely are much more challenging tasks. Rely on analytics and learn to listen to users: delve into reviews, conduct interviews, and test new products. Trust me, the efforts will pay off.

Continue tracking these six metrics. It's the first step towards perfecting customer experience. They'll alert you if something goes awry. However, understanding the underlying causes and addressing them timely are far more complex tasks. Depend on analytics and learn to listen to your users: dive into feedback, conduct interviews, and test new features. Rest assured, your efforts will be rewarded.