How likely are you to recommend us? The question explained

"How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?" is probably the most widely asked customer feedback question there is. It is short, it works for almost any business, and it produces a single number you can track over time.

It is also easy to misuse. Teams obsess over the number, compare it with figures they found online, and ignore the part of the answer that actually tells them what to do. This guide explains how the question works, how to work out a recommend score, why the follow-up matters more than the score, and the mistakes to avoid.

The question

The standard wording is:

On a scale of 0 to 10, how likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?

The scale runs from 0 ("Not at all likely") to 10 ("Extremely likely"). Both ends should be labelled. The middle usually isn't.

Why recommending, rather than satisfaction? Because recommending someone puts your own reputation on the line. A customer can be satisfied with a forgettable experience. Recommending it to a friend asks for more, so the question separates people who are merely content from people who are genuinely on your side.

Small wording changes are fine if they fit your business: "to a friend" for a café, "to a colleague" for business software, "to someone planning a similar trip" for a tour operator. Pick one wording and keep it, so your results stay comparable over time.

How the recommend score is worked out

Answers are sorted into three groups:

The recommend score is the share of promoters minus the share of detractors. Passives count towards the total but not towards either group.

Take a hypothetical café that got 200 replies in a month:

• 110 people scored 9 or 10: 55% promoters.
• 60 people scored 7 or 8: 30% passives.
• 30 people scored 0 to 6: 15% detractors.

The recommend score is 55 minus 15, which gives 40. It is written as a plain number, not a percentage, and can range from −100 (everyone a detractor) to +100 (everyone a promoter).

Two things about this calculation surprise people:

• A 7 or 8 counts for nothing. Moving a customer from 6 to 7 raises the score; moving them from 7 to 8 doesn't change it at all.
• The average hides the shape. Two businesses with the same average score can have very different recommend scores, because one has a cluster of 0s and 10s and the other has a mass of 7s and 8s.

That is deliberate. The score rewards enthusiasm and punishes unhappiness, and ignores polite middle answers.

The follow-up question is the valuable part

The number tells you how people feel. It doesn't tell you why, and you can't fix a number. Always follow the rating with an open question:

What's the main reason for your score?

That answer is where the useful information lives. A score of 40 is a headline. "The coffee is great but the queue at lunchtime is ridiculous", repeated in different words by a third of your detractors, is a plan.

Some variations work well depending on the score:

• For 9–10: "What do you like most about us?" Tells you what to protect, and gives you language your happy customers actually use.
• For 7–8: "What would make it a 10?" Passives are often one fix away from becoming promoters, and they'll tell you which.
• For 0–6: "What went wrong?" or "What should we have done differently?" Direct, and invites specifics.

Using logic to show a different follow-up for each group is worth doing, but a single "main reason" question also works fine.

Reading the answers

Once you have more than a few dozen answers, read them as data. Group each reply into topics (speed, price, staff, quality, booking) and note the tone of each mention. Then look at which topics come up most among detractors compared with promoters. The topics that appear mostly in low scores are what's costing you; the ones that appear mostly in high scores are what's earning you recommendations. Our guide to analysing open-ended survey responses walks through the method.

When you compare one month with the next, compare the share of replies that mention each topic, not the raw count. If you got twice as many replies in December, every topic will look like it doubled.

Pitfalls to watch for

Small samples

The recommend score swings a lot when you have few replies. With 20 answers, a single customer moving from detractor to promoter shifts the score by 10 points. With 2,000 answers it barely moves it.

Practical rules:

• Don't report a weekly score if you only get a handful of replies a week. Use a monthly or rolling 90-day figure instead.
• Show the number of replies next to the score, every time.
• Treat a change of a few points on a small sample as noise until it holds for two or three periods.

Comparing across industries

It is tempting to look up what a "good" recommend score is and measure yourself against it. Resist. Scores vary widely by industry, country, customer type and how and when the question is asked. A figure from a different industry, asked at a different moment, tells you very little about your own customers.

The comparison that matters is with yourself: this quarter against last quarter, this location against the others, customers who used the new booking system against those who didn't.

Asking at the wrong moment

The same customer can give you different scores depending on when you ask. Right after a great meal, a 10. A week later, after the card statement arrives, an 8. Choose a consistent moment (straight after a purchase, a visit or a support conversation) and stick to it, or you'll be measuring timing rather than experience.

Chasing the number

If staff are rewarded on the score, the score goes up. Not always because customers are happier: because staff ask only the happy ones, or mention that "anything below a 9 counts against me". Use the score to learn, not to judge individuals.

Asking only this question

One question can't tell you everything. It works best alongside a few specific ratings (product, service, value) and, crucially, the open follow-up. For how to fit it into a short form, see how to write a feedback form people finish.

What to do with detractors

A detractor who has just told you what went wrong is an opportunity. Reply quickly, personally and specifically: apologise for the particular problem, say what you're doing about it, and offer to put it right where you can. Many customers don't expect anyone to read their answer, so a reply alone can change how they feel about you.

Thank promoters too, and if they're happy to, invite them to leave a public review. The full approach is in our guide to closing the feedback loop.

Doing this with Userforms

Userforms has a recommend-score template with the 0–10 question and a follow-up, ready to edit. You can show different follow-ups for promoters, passives and detractors with form logic, and send it as a classic, step-by-step or chat-style form.

Every follow-up answer is filed into a topic hierarchy with the tone of each mention, and the dashboard shows which topics grew or shrank in share and turned better or worse compared with the previous period. Journeys can apologise to a low score, thank a high one and alert your team.

You can start for free, or see the plans on the pricing page.