Closing the NPS loop

Using Intercom and SatisMeter together

This is a guest post from customer feedback platform SatisMeter, an Intercom Platform Partner.

While SatisMeter is, in the simplest terms, an NPS tool, we think that used correctly one of its greatest benefits comes from customer communication. That’s why building an integration with Intercom was always going to be high on our to-do list.

We created Net Promoter System tool to help our customers measure satisfaction and loyalty, helping reduce churn. The success of this method comes down in part to the simplicity and efficiency of NPS, and in part to providing resources that turn feedback into two-way communication.

Why Net Promoter?

The Net Promoter System is a set of practices for collecting customer feedback, when implemented they give you a Net Promoter score somewhere between -100 and +100. It relies on one simple but effective question:

“How likely are you on a scale of 0–10 to recommend our product/service to a friend or colleague?”

This is followed by an open ended request for comments, such as “What can we do to improve?”. Research shows that the first question is well suited to predicting customer behaviour, asking only two questions means response rates remain high, and leaving the second open ended mean there’s no limit to the topics your feedback might cover.

Moreover, on the basis of how customers rate you they can be divided into three segments, Promoters (9–10), Passives (7–8), and Detractors (7–0), your score is calculated by subtracting the number of your detractors from the number of your Promoters.

More than a Score

That’s all well and good, but where does Intercom come into all this? While calculating a score can be helpful to monitor product changes, its applications are undeniably limited. That’s why we maintain that NPS should go far above and beyond a score alone.

Passing written feedback on to product teams is an important use for the feedback you gather, but we believe that the most important thing you can do for surveyed customers is close the loop.

Closing the Loop

If your customer take time out of their work to rate you, and even write a little about your product, we think you should take the time to get back to them. Depending on the size of your operation this can mean a number of things.

Detractors often dislike your product due to a lack of ability to use it to its full potential, so converting them into a happy customer can be as simple as a little customer training. Even when they have a serious issue, taking time to make contact and assure them that their views are heard can go a long way. Meanwhile Promoters can be asked to join recommendation schemes or incentivised to leave reviews.

We have customers who send entirely personalised emails to every NPS responder, addressing any concerns and thanking them for their feedback. While this is admirable, for many it’s just not possible.

SatisMeter and Intercom

Which brings us around to Intercom. For most NPS users, closing the loop will inevitably mean some degree of automation, and there’s nothing wrong with that! Integrating SatisMeter and Intercom will create events for actions such as viewing an NPS survey, and verbal feedback will be recorded as a message.

This means it takes little more than clicking a customer’s profile in Intercom to check out what feedback they’ve left you and how it might have changed over time. This works both ways, meaning that within your SatisMeter dashboard you can just find the Intercom logo in a user profile to go straight to their entire communication history.

What’s more, you can easily trigger an automated response to customers (via in-app message or email) depending on the rating they give. Many of our users have had success automatically offering trial extensions, discounts, or incentives for postings on public review sites.

Like so many companies, we already use Intercom for the vast majority of our customer communications, so adding our NPS info into that same network was an absolute no brainer. It adds to the ways we can segment our customers, lets us stay responsive to feedback, and facilitates essential conversations with our users.

The integration is easy to set up — learn more about it here.

Thanks to SatisMeter! To learn more about integrating with Intercom, visit the Developer Hub or see all integrations here.