What is a good NPS score?

Published industry benchmarks suggest that scores above 0 indicate more promoters than detractors, scores above 50 are considered strong, and scores above 70 are exceptional — but averages vary significantly by industry. Consumer technology companies often post different benchmarks than B2B SaaS or retail. The most useful comparison is your own score over time, not a generic industry average.

How is NPS different from sentiment score?

NPS comes from a structured survey you administer to your own customers; it measures loyalty and referral intent based on a direct question. Sentiment score is derived from analyzing the tone of social mentions and comments in the wild — text that people wrote voluntarily. NPS tells you how likely customers are to recommend you; sentiment tells you how the broader public is talking about you.

Glossary

Metrics

What is NPS (Net Promoter Score)? Definition & How It Works

Quick definition

NPS (Net Promoter Score) is a loyalty survey index — from −100 to +100 — measuring how likely customers are to recommend your brand to a friend.

Metrics

NPS (Net Promoter Score), explained

Part of the SocialKit social media glossary — browse every term.

How NPS is calculated

NPS is based on a single question: "On a scale of 0 to 10, how likely are you to recommend [Brand] to a friend or colleague?" Respondents who answer 9 or 10 are Promoters; those who answer 7 or 8 are Passives; those who answer 0 to 6 are Detractors. The score is Promoters (%) − Detractors (%), which produces a number from −100 (every respondent is a detractor) to +100 (every respondent is a promoter). Passives are excluded from the formula, though they matter as a conversion opportunity.

Why NPS connects to social marketing

Promoters are the people who leave positive reviews, refer friends, and share brand content without prompting — in social terms, they are your organic amplifiers. A brand with a high NPS has an audience that is predisposed to positive word of mouth, which makes every social post more likely to earn shares and comments that extend its reach. A brand with a declining NPS is managing a sentiment problem that social publishing alone cannot fix, and that problem will surface in negative comments, low engagement, and reputation monitoring signals.

A concrete example

A company surveys 200 customers and gets 80 Promoters (40%), 70 Passives (35%), and 50 Detractors (25%). NPS = 40% − 25% = 15. Three months later, after resolving a widely-discussed product issue, a follow-up survey yields 100 Promoters (50%), 60 Passives (30%), and 40 Detractors (20%). NPS climbs to 30. During that same period, organic social shares of brand content doubled — a correlation worth examining, as sentiment and organic amplification often move together.

How to track and act on NPS

Run NPS surveys at consistent intervals — typically after key customer milestones or on a quarterly basis — using a fixed methodology so trends are comparable. A single score is less useful than the trend direction and the open-text follow-up ("Why did you give that score?"), which surfaces the specific issues driving detractor responses. For social strategy, treat NPS as a leading indicator: rising scores suggest your audience will amplify content; falling scores suggest community management and product reputation need attention before reach can grow.

Where SocialKit fits

Brands with high NPS have audiences that share content organically — SocialKit keeps your publishing consistent across 11 networks so the positive sentiment your promoters feel translates into a steady stream of brand content they can amplify.

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FAQ

NPS (Net Promoter Score): common questions

Quick answers to the questions people ask most about this term.

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