Customer Effort Score (CES)

What is Customer Effort Score (CES)?

Customer Effort Score (CES) is a metric used to measure how much effort a customer has to exert to interact with a product or service. CES is typically gauged by asking customers to rate the ease of their experience on a scale, such as “How easy was it to resolve your issue today?” The score focuses on the simplicity of the customer’s interaction, making it a powerful indicator of customer satisfaction and future loyalty.

When is Customer Effort Score Used?

CES is often used in the following contexts:

• Post-Service Interactions: After a customer interacts with support or makes a purchase, CES measures how effortless that experience was.
• Product Feedback: CES can assess how easy it is for users to complete key tasks within a product, such as signing up, making a purchase, or resolving an issue.
• Customer Retention: High-effort interactions often correlate with customer churn, so CES helps in tracking and improving retention strategies.

Pros of Customer Effort Score

1. Simplicity: CES provides clear, straightforward feedback by focusing on how easy or difficult the customer found the experience.
2. Predictive of Loyalty: Research shows that CES is a strong predictor of customer loyalty. Customers who find their interactions effortless are more likely to remain loyal.
3. Actionable Insights: CES helps identify friction points in the customer journey, enabling teams to focus on reducing customer effort.
4. Reduces Churn: By lowering the effort required for customers, CES can help reduce churn and improve customer retention.

Cons of Customer Effort Score

1. Limited Scope: CES only measures effort, which might overlook other important aspects of the customer experience, such as satisfaction or emotional responses.
2. Not Product-Specific: CES might not capture specific product features or issues, instead focusing broadly on customer interactions.
3. Subjectivity: Customer perceptions of effort can be subjective, leading to inconsistent results if not properly contextualized.
4. Doesn’t Provide Full Context: While CES highlights effort, it doesn’t necessarily explain why a customer felt something was difficult, which may require further qualitative research.

How is Customer Effort Score Useful for Product Managers?

For product managers, Customer Effort Score provides a valuable tool for:

• Improving UX: CES helps product managers identify areas in the user interface or overall customer journey that are causing friction, guiding efforts to simplify the experience.
• Prioritizing Features: By highlighting high-effort areas, product managers can prioritize features or improvements that will reduce effort and increase customer satisfaction.
• Tracking Product Success: CES serves as a key performance indicator for product success, especially for customer-centric products where ease of use is a competitive advantage.
• Collaboration with Customer Support: CES insights can help product managers collaborate with support teams to ensure that the product is easy to use and that customer issues are resolved quickly and effortlessly.

When Should Customer Effort Score Not Be Used?

CES may not be the most appropriate tool in the following cases:

• Measuring Overall Satisfaction: If the goal is to measure customer satisfaction or emotional connection to the brand, CES is limited since it only focuses on effort, not satisfaction or delight.
• Complex Experiences: For complex customer journeys where multiple touchpoints are involved, a CES might not provide enough detail to understand the full customer experience.
• Niche or Specialized Products: In cases where effort is expected (e.g., technical or high-involvement products), CES might not accurately reflect customer expectations or satisfaction.

Relevant Questions for Product Managers

Q1: How can CES be integrated into product development?

• Answer: CES can be integrated by collecting feedback during key points of the user journey, such as onboarding, feature use, or support interactions. By analyzing CES data, product teams can identify and prioritize changes that make the product easier to use.

Q2: How often should CES be measured?

• Answer: CES should be measured regularly, especially after customer interactions with high-impact touchpoints like customer support, onboarding, or completing a transaction. This helps track improvements over time and ensures that effort is consistently minimized.

Q3: What are the typical benchmarks for CES?

• Answer: CES benchmarks vary by industry, but typically, a lower score (indicating easier interaction) is better. Product managers should compare their CES results against industry standards and their own historical data to set improvement targets.

Conclusion

The Customer Effort Score (CES) is a powerful tool for product managers to measure and improve the ease of customer interactions with their product. By focusing on reducing friction and simplifying the customer journey, CES helps ensure higher customer satisfaction and loyalty. However, CES should be used alongside other metrics to provide a comprehensive view of the customer experience, as it does not capture satisfaction or emotional engagement.