Three questions, three meanings
| Aspect | CSAT | NPS | CES |
|---|---|---|---|
| Question | How satisfied were you with...? | How likely are you to recommend us? | How easy was it to...? |
| Measures | Satisfaction with an interaction | Willingness to recommend the company | Effort to get something done |
| Scale | Usually 1 to 5 | 0 to 10 | 1 (very difficult) to 5 or 7 (very easy) |
| Calculation | Share of top scores, or average | Promoters minus detractors, -100 to +100 | Average, or share answering easy |
| Where it fits | After a store visit or purchase | Every few months, for the relationship | After a return, complaint or support contact |
The CSAT vs NPS vs CES choice is about which question fits the moment. Each asks something different, and each is useful in a different place.
- CSAT: "How satisfied were you with...?" Satisfaction with a specific interaction.
- NPS: "How likely are you to recommend us...?" Willingness to recommend the company.
- CES: "How easy was it to...?" The effort the customer had to make to get something done.
Customer Effort Score
CES asks customers how easy or difficult it was to do something, such as return a product, resolve a problem or change a booking, usually on a scale from very difficult to very easy. It rests on a simple idea: in service moments, reducing effort matters more than impressing. A 2010 Harvard Business Review article by Matthew Dixon, Karen Freeman and Nick Toman, "Stop Trying to Delight Your Customers", challenged the belief that companies must go above and beyond in customer service.
The 2010 HBR article.
Stop Trying to Delight Your Customers, Dixon, Freeman and Toman (Harvard Business Review, July–August 2010)- Question: "How easy was it to [return your item / get your issue resolved] today?"
- Scale: commonly 1 (very difficult) to 5 or 7 (very easy).
- Calculation: average, or the share of respondents answering easy or very easy.
- When: immediately after a service or process interaction.
CSAT and NPS in brief
CSAT asks about satisfaction with a specific interaction, usually on a 1 to 5 scale, reported as the share of top scores or an average. NPS asks about likelihood to recommend on 0 to 10; promoters (9 to 10) minus detractors (0 to 6) gives a score from -100 to +100.
How NPS is defined and calculated.
Measuring your Net Promoter Score (Net Promoter System, Bain & Company)CSAT vs NPS: the difference and when to use each.
Csat vs nps the differenceWhere each fits
- After a store visit or purchase: CSAT.
- After a return, complaint resolution or support contact: CES, optionally with CSAT.
- Every few months, for the relationship: NPS.
- After onboarding or a big change: CES for the process, NPS for the relationship.
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Combining them
A sensible setup for a multi-store brand: CSAT after visits and orders, CES after returns and support, NPS each quarter. Report each separately, by store and channel, with response counts. Then add the reasons: one open question per survey, and the topics customers raise in public reviews. When CSAT falls at a store, the reviews and comments say why.
How to measure customer experience.
How to measure customer experiencePitfalls
- Asking all three in every survey. Survey fatigue lowers response rates and quality.
- Using CES for moments that are not about effort, such as a restaurant meal.
- Comparing scales across surveys that use different wording.
- Setting staff targets on scores, which invites gaming.
Common questions
Is CES better than NPS?
They measure different things. CES suits service and process moments; NPS suits the overall relationship.
Can reviews replace surveys?
Not entirely. Reviews are unprompted and public; surveys are structured and private. Each fills gaps in the other.
How many questions should a survey have?
One score, one open reason, and at most one or two specific questions.
What is a good CES?
Compare with your own history and similar processes; effort is very process-specific.
An example setup
A fashion retailer with stores and an app uses all three. After each store visit, a one-question CSAT by WhatsApp with an open reason. After each return or exchange, CES: "How easy was it to return your item?" Every quarter, NPS to a sample of loyalty members. Reviews on Google and the Play Store are classified by topic alongside. When CES for returns falls at a group of stores, the open answers and the reviews both point to a new rule requiring the original card for refunds; the rule is changed and CES recovers the next month.
Doing this with Falcon
Falcon adds the review-based measures to your CX metrics: for every theme and store, the volume of mentions, negative share, its change month to month and the number of reviews behind it, from Google Maps reviews of your stores and Google Play reviews of your app. Every number opens the reviews that explain it, which survey scores alone cannot do.