11 customer experience metrics and KPIs to track

With the internet at their fingertips and countless brands to choose from, customers have a high standard for customer experience (CX). Companies that focus on improving their CX are likely to see an 80% increase in their revenue, according to research by Zippia, and most of them recognize that they’re not doing enough.

But before you can improve CX, you need to know what needs changing. That’s why you should measure customer satisfaction and how it’s impacting your business. You’ll be primed to make targeted improvements to meet—and exceed—customer expectations. 

Tracking the right CX metrics and KPIs provides invaluable insight into where a company excels—and where it falls short—from first contact to post-purchase support.

In this article, we’ll identify 11 CX metrics and KPIs that businesses should measure as part of their CX research, so they’re equipped to make targeted improvements for happier customers and a healthier bottom line. 

We’ll be looking at the following CX metrics:

1. Net promoter score (NPS)

NPS measures customer loyalty and satisfaction based on a straightforward, single-question survey. The NPS survey simply asks customers to rate how likely they are to recommend a product or service to friends or colleagues, on a scale of 0 to 10. 

The responses categorize customers into three segments:

• Promoters (score 9–10): These are the customers who are most likely to remain loyal to the brand and can actively spread the good word to others. 
• Passives (score 7–8): These are satisfied customers who aren’t enthusiastic enough to be loyal promoters. They’re also unlikely to damage your brand by word of mouth but are on the fence about becoming enthusiastic promoters. 

• Detractors (score 0–6): Unhappy customers who are unlikely to purchase again and may even dissuade others from considering your products or services.

Why should you measure NPS?

Compared to other metrics, an NPS score is easy to gather and takes less than a minute of your respondent’s time. Simply send the survey question to customers, along with a potential follow-up question based on their provided score. 

Here’s how an NPS benefits your business:

• You can segment customers based on their engagement and satisfaction levels 
• Since NPS is a standard metric that companies across the globe use, you can see how your score compares with the industry benchmark

Here’s how to calculate an NPS:

1. Then, calculate the percentage of promoters, detractors, and passives
2. Subtract the percentage of detractors from the number of promoters, resulting in an NPS between -100 and +100

A negative score implies that a company has more detractors than promoters, while the reverse is true for a positive score.

NPS = % promoters – % detractors

2. Customer effort score (CES)

CES measures how easily a customer can find information or get an issue resolved. 

CES is calculated in real-time by sending customers a survey after they complete an action, such as completing a purchase or engaging with customer support. 

The survey should contain a statement like “[company name] made it easy for me to use [product] or handle [issue]” with a 1–5 effort rating for the recipient to select. The lower the number, the less effort it takes for customers to complete that action—and the more satisfied customers are with ease of use. 

Why should you measure CES?

CES directly targets a key aspect of CX: convenience. As per a Salesforce report, 61% of customers prefer self-service to resolve simpler issues, and 74% want to be able to do anything online that they can do in person or over the phone. 

This means customers expect their interactions with a brand to be quick and seamless. They also want to be able to figure out simple issues on their own. 

CES is the average of all collected scores. 

CES = sum of your customer effort score ÷ total number of survey responses

If you plan on using emoticons to measure customer efforts, just ensure you assign a score to each emoticon.

3. Customer satisfaction

Customer satisfaction measures the extent to which your products, services, or overall brand experience meet customer expectations. It’s measured by segregating data (such as customer satisfaction score (CSAT), CES, NPS, social sentiment score, and more) from sources like social media, surveys, and focus groups. 

Why should you measure customer satisfaction?

Measuring customer satisfaction helps identify problem areas in your business and provides a holistic view of the health and loyalty of your customer base. 

Customer satisfaction surveys should ideally be launched whenever a customer enters a new phase in the customer experience, such as finishing a trial period or interacting with a support chatbot. Here, a CSAT score would measure the success of the specific event, while NPS and CES would measure brand loyalty and overall sentiment. 

CSAT calculation

Besides calculating NPS and CES, you can send out CSAT surveys to gauge customer satisfaction levels and calculate the percentage of satisfied customers.

% satisfied customers = (number of satisfied responses ÷ total number of surveys sent ) x 100

You can also use free CSAT calculators to fast-track this calculation.

Social sentiment

Sentiment analysis tools help track what people say about your brand on social media—and analyze positive and negative comments, reviews, reactions, and messages. 

Social sentiment score = (number of positive reactions – number of negative reactions) ÷ (total number of reactions) x 100

4. Churn rate

Your churn rate refers to the number of lost customers over a given time period. This is a critical metric for businesses with a recurring revenue model, like SaaS vendors.

Even a slight variation in churn rate can significantly impact your business revenue, so it’s important to keep a close eye on it.

Why should you measure churn rate?

Churn rate reveals whether your marketing strategies are relevant to your target market. On a deeper level, it helps you understand your product–market fit and whether your product meets the needs of your target audience. 

With these insights, you can adjust marketing strategies or test new features to improve customer satisfaction and retention.

Additionally, the chances of selling to an existing customer are around 60–70%, while it’s only around 5–20% for new customers. So, a reduction in the churn rate signals a loss in profit, which you can and should act upon as soon as possible.  

Churn rate = (lost customers ÷ total customers at the beginning of a time period) x 100

Here, the time period is typically the last quarter or financial year—but it can be any period you want to measure.

5. Retention rate

Your retention rate is the opposite of your churn rate, in that it refers to the number of customers retained over a given period. While it accounts for existing customers who continued to engage with your business in the given time frame, it doesn’t include new customers acquired in between. 

Why should you measure retention rate?

A business with a recurring revenue model generates most of its revenue from repeat users or subscribers. This is where knowing your customer retention metrics is highly beneficial because it helps you develop a targeted retention strategy that drives more revenue. Here are a few more reasons to measure retention rate:

• The longer you retain customers, the greater the profit
• It allows you to upsell to long-term customers
• Loyal customers are more likely to become brand ambassadors

Retention rate = [(number of remaining customers by the end of a given period – number of new customers acquired within the given period) ÷ number of customers at the start of the given period] x 100

Here, the time period is typically the last quarter, but it can be any date range. 

6. Customer emotional intensity

Customer emotional intensity refers to the customer’s emotional response when interacting with a brand or service. The intensity can vary widely from customer to customer and situation to situation, and is often influenced by: 

• Customer expectations
• Personal values
• Circumstances of the service or product experience

Why should you measure emotional intensity?

Emotional responses are not just about whether a customer is happy or unhappy; rather, it’s about how deeply they feel those emotions, and how those feelings influence their attitude and behavior towards the brand.

For example, consider two customers who encounter a problem with a late delivery.

Customer A experienced mild annoyance because the item was not urgently needed. This reflects low emotional intensity (level 1), which is unlikely to affect their future interactions if quickly resolved.

Customer B‌ ordered the same product for a specific event, making timely delivery crucial. They experienced high emotional intensity (level 5) due to a missed event, which leads to significant distress and damaged brand loyalty and reputation.

Recognizing these emotional intensity levels allows you to tailor your responses effectively. For Customer B, a mere apology won’t suffice—you’ll need a more personalized and compensatory approach to rebuild their trust.

Numerous CX platforms will allow you to create custom surveys to gauge emotional intensity. 

7. First response time (FRT)

First Response Time (FRT) indicates the average time between a customer opening a ticket and receiving the initial response from a service agent. This initial interaction sets the tone for the customer’s entire experience with the company and can heavily influence their overall brand satisfaction.

Why should you measure FRT?

• FRT helps management assess the service team’s readiness to handle requests and meet operational standards.
• Communicating your FRT establishes customer expectations, and demonstrates to customers that their concerns are acknowledged and valued.
• Customers are more likely to return to a business that they feel listens to them and addresses their needs quickly.

FRT = (sum of first response times ÷ number of contacts) x 100

Here, the sum of first response times is the total time it took for each customer to get a response from the support team, over a given period.

8. Average resolution time (ART) 

ART measures the average time taken to address and resolve a customer query, from the moment it’s raised until the issue is resolved and the interaction concludes.

A prolonged average resolution time may signal underlying issues like inadequate staffing, inefficient processes, or insufficient training for support agents. Conversely, a short resolution time indicates that customer service and support systems are functioning effectively.

Why should you measure average resolution time?

Your average resolution time reflects the quality of support your brand offers to customers. It also helps identify agents who are unable to manage their workload or require additional training and support. 

ART also helps you assess the efficiency of existing systems and processes. For example, if your support team takes hours to find a simple solution, perhaps a new tool can help expedite the resolution process.

Average resolution time = total of the resolution time for tickets solved in a specific timeframe ÷ total number of tickets solved in that timeframe

9. Customer sentiment

Customer sentiment refers to the attitudes, opinions, and emotions customers express toward your brand and products. It reflects whether their views are positive, negative, or neutral about your brand and significantly influences their decision to stay with you as a customer. 

Companies often use automation, machine learning, and natural language processing (NLP) to analyze sentiment in customer feedback from different channels, such as surveys, social media, and reviews. 

For example, Toast uses Wevo to gauge customer sentiment on certain web pages to better understand what really resonates with its audience.

Why should you measure customer sentiment?

• Customer sentiment helps support teams understand what triggers negative emotions in your customers
• You can pinpoint specific sections of your business (eCommerce site, checkout page, etc) that customers find frustrating, so you can optimize CX more effectively.

10. Customer lifetime value (CLV)

Customer lifetime value is the total value a customer brings to a company over the entire duration of their relationship with the brand. CLV takes various factors into account, such as:

• Revenue generated from purchases 
• Frequency of purchases
• Average order value
• Duration of the customer’s relationship with the company

Why should you measure CLV?

CLV helps you make strategic decisions about resource allocation, marketing strategies, and customer acquisition efforts.

• You can identify customers who contribute the most to revenue and segment your audience accordingly.
• It helps you pre-empt issues by analyzing customer behavior, spending patterns, and preferences.
• By focusing on increasing CLV and retaining existing customers, you can save on customer acquisition costs.

Customer lifetime value = [number of purchases x value of purchase (in revenue or profit) x average customer lifespan] 

11. Customer referral rate (CRR)

Customer referral rate is the percentage of customers who complete a purchase after being referred by an existing customer. A good CRR means your word-of-mouth marketing or referral programs are generating high-quality leads. 

Why should you measure CRR?

Referral marketing is typically more cost-effective than other forms of customer acquisition. By measuring CRR, you can leverage existing relationships to acquire new customers at a lower cost.

Referred customers also tend to be of higher quality compared to customers acquired through other channels, and offer a higher lifetime value. 

Referral rate = (number of referrals you got in a timeframe ÷  total number of customers in that timeframe) x 100

Don’t just track metrics—improve them, with Wevo

Tracking CX metrics is crucial to delivering exceptional service and building long-lasting customer relationships. With detailed insights into how customers respond to your customer service and product offering, your team is better equipped to maintain a culture of continuous improvement for CX.

However, simply tracking CX metrics isn’t enough. Rather, you should strive to dig deep into customer behavior and understand exactly how customers are using your product. 

With Wevo’s UX research platform, you can illuminate your entire customer experience—pinpointing where customers are struggling, showing whether they’re getting the most value, and revealing their specific likes and dislikes. It even helps with testing live customer engagement.

For actionable insight into your customer experience, at scale, check out Wevo’s offerings today.