Overview
The majority of my work at Vivint Solar involved a lot of user research. While there, I learned the value of making process-improvement recommendations from user data.
Another analyst and myself designed and implemented an NPS (Net Promoter Score) system across the company to help improve customer satisfaction.
NPS, often referred to as the ‘Ultimate Question’ asks users, “ On a scale of 1-10 how likely would you be to refer us to a friend or family member?” According to Bain and Company research, this one question provides more insight on customer satisfaction and the company’s health than any other question you could ask.
The NPS Calculation
Respondents are grouped as follows:
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Promoters (score 9-10) are loyal enthusiasts who will keep buying and refer others, fueling growth.
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Passives (score 7-8) are satisfied but unenthusiastic customers who are vulnerable to competitive offerings.
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Detractors (score 0-6) are unhappy customers who can damage your brand and impede growth through negative word-of-mouth.
Subtracting the percentage of Detractors from the percentage of Promoters yields the Net Promoter Score, which can range from a low of -100 (if every customer is a Detractor) to a high of 100 (if every customer is a Promoter).
Survey Tool Recommendation
I was responsible for deciding which software we would purchase to distribute and gather these surveys. This task proved to be deceptively difficult because of the constraints.
We needed a program that would not only be delightful to our customers but also under budget. We also needed the software to integrate with our already-established Salesforce backbone so we had to work internally with that team to figure out which solution made the most sense. We also had to consider what dashboards would look like and how our executives would use those to make decisions.
In addition, we needed a solution that would scale effectively with the company's growth. The sample size was relatively small at first with only 20,000 surveys sent out, but we would eventually need over half a million. In order to reach a decision that made sense, I organized demo's from numerous sales reps to come and pitch their software.
User Research
From the data we collected, we were able to make some valuable recommendations to the top executives of our company. We could do so with confidence because every suggestion came from our customers.
Once our solution was rolled out, we wanted to be prepared on how we would 'Close the Loop' or handle particular customers. To map everything out, we created personas:
From our NPS data, we learned people actually valued communication over speed of install. The company had been operating under the assumption that speed of install was the biggest issue and was thus pouring money and resources into making it faster instead of simply communicating to the customer.
After identifying this issue, we created an email notification system that would update customers on their installation process. We surveyed the same group of customers later, and their satisfaction had gone up significantly.
From this research our marketing team decided that making a Customer Portal would be a good way for users to stay in touch during the installation process. The problem was that users would need to log on to a separate website and create a profile in order to view where they were at in the process.
Change the Experience, not the Product
We already had a customer portal that was in place but none of our customers were using it. I suggested that instead of wasting time and resources on something that already existed, we simply plug a progress bar into the emails that we were already sending them. This way we were "pushing" information to the user rather than making them "pull it" from the web. I was able to work with some of the developers to code the emails, refining my CSS and HTML skills along the way.
