How to Create Goals for NPS®

If you’re reading this, you’re probably already measuring or considering Net Promoter Score (NPS). While NPS is a relatively simple concept—deriving a customer loyalty metric based on responses to a single question in your customer survey—in reality, there are a number of best practices that must be followed to ensure your company fully realizes the benefits of a well-run NPS program.

Using the “likely to recommend” question in the right surveys, generating high survey response rates, delivering representative and trustworthy data to leadership, interpreting the feedback objectively and without bias, and having a process to act on the insights are just a few key requirements for running a successful NPS program.

Over the years, I’ve worked with dozens of B2B companies that set out to become more customer-centric, only to find themselves stuck in the trap of chasing metrics without meaningful improvement. NPS is a potent tool, but like all tools, it’s only effective if used properly. This discussion has frequently led to the best ways to orient a company culture around customer-centricity and motivate employees to behave in accordance with the stated vision and values. For some organizations, one practice that has proven effective is to set NPS targets and sometimes even tie variable compensation to those targets.

Let’s discuss how to set goals around NPS that reinforce a culture of customer excellence, drive real behavior change, and ultimately contribute to customer renewal, expansion, and advocacy.

Understand What NPS Tells You

At its core, NPS is a simple question: “On a scale from 0 to 10, how likely are you to recommend our company to a friend or colleague?”

From the responses, you calculate:

• Promoters (9-10)
• Passives (7-8)
• Detractors (0-6)

The formula is straightforward: NPS = % Promoters − % Detractors

However, while the math is simple, interpreting it requires nuance. NPS is a directional measure of sentiment. It gives you a sense of how customers feel in aggregate, but without context, it doesn’t tell you why. That’s why, at Satrix Solutions, we believe in going beyond the NPS question and follow-up (“Why did you give that score?”) and designing slightly longer survey questionnaires for our B2B clients. This ensures they have context around the score and can quantitatively assess key drivers of satisfaction and frustration.

Armed with robust insights, B2B companies can leverage a more comprehensive understanding of customer sentiment before establishing NPS goals. Before you set any goals, it’s also critical to establish a reliable baseline. Only then can you begin to formulate a thoughtful improvement plan.

Decide What Kind of Goal You Want

There are three main ways companies approach and communicate NPS goals:

1. The Fixed Number: “Increase NPS from 30 to 40 by year-end.”
2. The Directional Goal: “Ensure NPS is trending upward each survey wave.”
3. The Behavioral Goal: “Reduce the number of detractors by addressing systemic issues, and the score will follow.”

Each has merit but also comes with some risk. For example, a fixed number provides clarity and measurability but can also lead to unintended consequences if teams feel pressure to “game” the score. Directional goals may not be specific enough to generate the desired behaviors. Behavioral goals help focus the organization on particular pain points, but some employees may feel disconnected if the problem areas are outside their control. This is why the ‘right’ approach for another organization may not be the right one for yours. There isn’t one right way to set your goals, and variable compensation programs should be based on your company’s values, culture, maturity, etc.

Use Industry Benchmarks (Cautiously)

Too many executives arbitrarily target an NPS of 70 because they heard it was “world-class.” But context matters. A “good” NPS varies wildly by industry. For example:

• SaaS companies might aim for 20-50
• Consumer brands could see 60+
• B2B services often land in the 10-40 range

The better approach is to look at your historical performance. If your NPS has been flat at 35 for the last two years, a goal of 38-40 may be ambitious and achievable. A 10-point jump? Probably not without a significant shift in experience.

Tie NPS Goals to What You Can Control

This is key. You can’t control how every customer will respond to a survey. However, you can control your teams’ actions that influence the customer experience.

Break down your NPS improvement strategy by team:

Customer Success:

• Follow up with detractors within 48 hours
• Conduct QBRs with top accounts
• Use health scores to identify at-risk customers

Product:

• Prioritize customer-requested features
• Resolve bugs impacting top use cases
• Improve UX on commonly used workflows

Support:

• Reduce first response time
• Increase CSAT
• Improve first-contact resolution rates

Marketing:

• Share customer success stories
• Educate on underused features
• Encourage Promoters to leave reviews or refer others

These actions can positively influence how customers perceive your company and your NPS.

Decide Whether to Tie Compensation to NPS

This one requires care. Tying compensation to NPS can drive focus, but it can also encourage teams to game the system.

If you go this route:

• Use NPS trends, not a single score
• Set team goals, not individual ones
• Pair NPS with qualitative customer feedback

Alternatively, reward behaviors that lead to NPS improvement:

• Proactive follow-up with at-risk accounts
• Innovations based on customer feedback
• Customer recovery efforts that result in saved accounts

The key is recognizing and reinforcing the actions that improve the customer experience—not just the number.

Revisit and Iterate Quarterly

Customer expectations evolve. So should your goals.

Every six months or so, it’s a good idea to evaluate your customer feedback data and ask:

• Is our NPS trending in the right direction?
• Are the themes in customer feedback changing?
• What actions have we taken since the last survey?
• Where are we seeing early wins—or ongoing gaps?

Adjust your goals as needed. The goal isn’t perfection. It’s continuous, thoughtful progress.

What If You Don’t Set a Numeric NPS Goal?

That’s perfectly fine. Some of the most customer-obsessed companies I’ve worked with never set a hard NPS target. Instead, they:

• Ensure NPS / customer sentiment is discussed in every leadership meeting.
• Review feedback weekly or monthly. Ensure the senior team has many ways to regularly ‘hear’ the voice of the customer.
• Set team-level CX initiatives. What motivates Sales may be very different from what motivates Technical Support.
• Celebrate behavior, not just results. .Team members who consistently go above and beyond for customers should be recognized used as examples for others.
• Ensure your employees are doing a good job serving other employees. A commitment to service excellence starts from within. If your CS team can’t get a response from the product organization to address a customer concern, it will immediately set the wrong tone for the organization.

If your culture is still developing, this approach can be more effective than targeting a specific number.

Final Thoughts

NPS can be an incredibly useful guidepost—but it’s not the destination. Your real goal is delivering an experience so good that customers stay, grow, and advocate for you.

When you tie NPS goals to your company’s purpose, empower teams with clear actions, and use customer feedback to drive improvement—not just to monitor sentiment—you build more than a metric. You create a customer-first culture.

And that, more than any number, is what drives growth.