What each one measures
- CSAT (Customer Satisfaction) asks, right after an interaction: "How satisfied were you with this support experience?" It's transactional — tied to one ticket.
- NPS (Net Promoter Score) asks, periodically: "How likely are you to recommend us?" It's relational — about the whole product relationship.
Support owns CSAT. NPS is a company-wide number that support influences but doesn't control.
Why optimizing NPS in support is a trap
If you tie agent performance to NPS, you're holding agents accountable for pricing, product gaps, and roadmap decisions they can't change. A customer can love your support and still be a detractor because the product is missing a feature. Use CSAT to evaluate support quality.
Reading CSAT honestly
- Response rate matters. A 90% CSAT on a 5% response rate is mostly noise. Push to get response rates above 20%.
- Watch the distribution, not just the average. Ten 5-stars and two 1-stars averages well but hides two furious customers. Read every low score.
- Negative CSAT is your best feedback channel. Every 1- or 2-star rating should trigger a follow-up.
The third metric worth tracking
Customer Effort Score (CES) — "How easy was it to get your issue resolved?" — often predicts loyalty better than CSAT. Customers don't want to be delighted by support; they want their problem gone with minimum effort.
Practical setup
Send CSAT automatically on ticket close. Run a relationship NPS quarterly at the account level. Sample CES on a subset of resolved tickets. Don't drown customers in surveys — one ask per closed ticket is the ceiling.