How to Analyze Customer Effort Score (CES) in Excel?

Any successful business must prioritize the happiness of its customers. Measuring and analyzing customer feedback is an ongoing process that helps businesses better understand their clientele.

Businesses use Customer Effort Scores to gauge customer happiness and ensure service improvements.

This scenario of a large retail chain exemplifies the usefulness of a Customer Effort Score. The chain was interested in hearing from its clientele, then improve its customer service.

After much deliberation, they settled on the Customer Effort Score as the metric by which to evaluate client happiness.

They polled buyers on how they felt about the transaction process using a 1–5 scale. They found that customers who rated their experience as 4 or 5 were more likely to return to the store.

Furthermore, they used this data to identify areas to improve. Thus, increasing customer happiness.

Table of Content:

1. What is Customer Effort Score (CES)?
2. How to Calculate Customer Effort Score?
3. What is a Good Customer Effort Score?
4. Advantages and Disadvantages of the Customer Effort Score
5. What is the Difference between NPS vs. CSAT vs. CES?
6. How to Analyze Customer Effort Score (CES) in Excel?
7. How to Improve Your Customer Effort Score?
8. Wrap Up

This blog post will look at the Customer Effort Score and how to calculate and analyze it.

What is Customer Effort Score (CES)?

Customer Effort Score (CES) is a metric that gauges customer satisfaction and aid businesses in improving customer service. It is a survey where customers respond to a single question on a scale of 1 to 5.

Additionally, it’s a useful tool for businesses to gauge client loyalty. From this, they can determine how likely customers will recommend their products to others.

How to Calculate Customer Effort Score?

To calculate the Customer Effort Score, businesses ask their customers to rate their experience. The rating can be on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being the most difficult and 5 being the easiest.

For example, let’s say you ask your customers to respond to the following statement.

“The product was easy to use”.

They are to respond using a scale of 1 to 5. 5 is for “strongly agree”, and 1 is for “strongly disagree”.

Suppose you receive 60 responses from this survey and a total sum of 240. Then how do you calculate your CES?

Here is the formula:

CES Score = (Total sum of responses) ÷ (Number of responses)

Therefore, your survey will yield the following results:

CES score = (240 ÷ 60) = 4

A CES score of 4 is good. This shows that your customers are happy with your customer service.

What is a Good Customer Effort Score?

A good Customer Effort Score will depend on the scale you use in your survey. For instance, we obtained a good score in the example we have used above to calculate CES. This is because we have used a scale of 1 (“strongly disagree”) to 5 (“strongly agree”). A score of 4 and above is a good score.

Let’s say we used a scale of 1 to 10. Where 10 is for “strongly agree” and 1 is for “strongly disagree”. Here a good score would be between 7 and 10.

Advantages and Disadvantages of the Customer Effort Score

Advantages of Customer Effort Score

• User-friendly: CES is a straightforward survey that customers can complete quickly, making it simple to gather customer feedback.
• Economical: The CES is an economical way to receive customer feedback and gauge customer satisfaction.
• Actionable: It offers insights you can apply to enhance customer service and increase customer satisfaction.
• Reliable: CES is dependable for tracking changes in customer satisfaction over time.

Disadvantages of Customer Effort Score

• Limitations: The CES can only measure customer satisfaction with customer service. It does not assess customer satisfaction with other business-related factors.
• Subjective: Customer perception, based on CES, can be subjective. As a result, findings may be erroneous because consumers may view the same activity differently.
• Difficult to compare: Customer service standards can vary from company to company, so it is challenging to compare CES scores.
• Inaccuracy: Customers can rate their amount of effort inaccurately, which could produce erroneous results.

What is the Difference between NPS vs. CSAT vs. CES?

CES, NPS, and CSAT, are all important customer satisfaction metrics used by businesses. But what exactly are the differences between them?

To exhaust the differences, let’s examine some examples and visualizations created with ChartExpo.

• Net Promoter Score (NPS)

NPS measures how likely customers are to recommend your business. This metric can give you an indication of how satisfied your customers are. It also tells you how strong your customer-brand relationship is.

To calculate NPS, customers indicate on a scale how likely they are to recommend your business to others.

You can use the following question to conduct an NPS survey.

• How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?

This is sample data from a survey conducted with the question above.

Question	Scale	Responses
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?	1	40
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?	2	50
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?	3	100
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?	4	250
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?	5	55
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?	6	100
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?	7	150
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?	8	200
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?	9	500
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend or colleague?	10	400

Here is the visualization of the data obtained.

Below is a visualization you can use to visualize an NPS scale when you have multiple questions. It shows the total responses and presents the NPS scores in small boxes against each query.

If the promoter percentage exceeds the detractor percentage, the NPS will be in a green block. If the promoter percentage is lower than the detractor percentage, NPS will be in a red block.

• Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT)

CSAT measures how satisfied customers are with their experience with a company. This metric helps you understand how well your customer service is working.

To calculate CSAT, customers rate on a scale of how satisfied they are with their experience.

You can use this score to identify areas of your customer service requiring improvement.

You can use the following questions for a CSAT survey.

• How do you rate our cleaning staff’s behavior?
• How do you rate the quality of the service received?
• How do you rate the quality of the beverage?
• How do you rate the dining experience?
• Was the food served hot and fresh?
• Was the server friendly and patient when taking an order?
• Was the server able to answer all questions?
• Will you recommend our services to your circle?

Let’s say you obtain the results as tabulated below.

Questions	Opinions	Responses
How do you rate our cleaning staff’s behavior?	detractors	0
How do you rate our cleaning staff’s behavior?	promoters	57
How do you rate the quality of the service received?	detractors	71
How do you rate the quality of the service received?	promoters	0
How do you rate the quality of beverage?	detractors	0
How do you rate the quality of beverage?	promoters	83
How do you rate dining experience?	detractors	57
How do you rate dining experience?	promoters	0
Was the food served hot and fresh?	detractors	0
Was the food served hot and fresh?	promoters	49
Was the server friendly and patient when taking an order?	detractors	0
Was the server friendly and patient when taking an order?	promoters	91
Was the server able to answer all questions?	detractors	45
Was the server able to answer all questions?	promoters	0
Will you recommend our services in your circle?	detractors	0
Will you recommend our services in your circle?	promoters	65

The final visualization for this data will appear as shown below.

• Customer Effort Score (CES)

CES measures how much effort customers put in to have their issues resolved. This aids in determining whether your customer service process needs improvement and how simple it is.

To calculate CES, customers rate the amount of effort required to fix their problem on a scale.

For instance, you can ask these questions in your CES survey:

• It was easy for me to purchase the product online.
• The website is easy to navigate to find all the products.
• Support team on live chat is good at recommending the product I need.
• Interaction with your advertisement took me to the exact product page.

Let’s say the survey yields the results tabulated below.

Questions	Scale	Responses
It was easy for you to purchase the product online?	1	151
It was easy for you to purchase the product online?	2	252
It was easy for you to purchase the product online?	3	473
It was easy for you to purchase the product online?	4	867
It was easy for you to purchase the product online?	5	713
Website is easy to navigate to find all the products?	1	246
Website is easy to navigate to find all the products?	2	130
Website is easy to navigate to find all the products?	3	407
Website is easy to navigate to find all the products?	4	867
Website is easy to navigate to find all the products?	5	779
Support team on live chat easily resolved your issue.	1	136
Support team on live chat easily resolved your issue.	2	219
Support team on live chat easily resolved your issue.	3	462
Support team on live chat easily resolved your issue.	4	989
Support team on live chat easily resolved your issue.	5	921

Here is the final visualization of the data.

How to Analyze Customer Effort Score (CES) in Excel?

Analysis of Customer Effort Scores in Excel can be time-consuming. However, you can easily analyze Customer Effort Scores using ChartExpo.

To visualize your Customer Effort Scores, you can create charts and graphs with ChartExpo.

Once you have created your visualizations, you can use them to analyze your Customer Effort Score data.

You can identify trends in customer effort over time and places where customers are experiencing difficulties. This can help you find where you can improve the customer experience.

How to Install ChartExpo in Excel?

1. Open your Excel application.
2. Open the worksheet and click on the “Insert” menu.
3. You’ll see the “My Apps”.
4. In office Add-ins window, click on “Store” and search for ChartExpo on my Apps Store.
5. Click on “Add” button to install ChartExpo in your Excel.

ChartExpo charts and graphs are available both in Google Sheets and Microsoft Excel. Please use the following CTA’s to install the tool of your choice and create beautiful visualizations in a few clicks in your favorite tool.

Example

Let’s create a Likert Scale Chart of the example above on CES survey questions.

• To get started with ChartExpo, install ChartExpo in Excel.
• Now Click on My Apps from the INSERT menu.

• Choose ChartExpo from My Apps, then click Insert.

• Once ChartExpo is loaded. Click on “Likert Scale Chart” from the list of charts.

• Click “Create Chart From Selection” button after selecting the data from the sheet, as shown.

• The Likert Scale Chart will look like as follows.

• If you want to have the title of chart, click on Edit Chart, as shown in the above image.
• To change the title of the chart, click on the pencil icon that is available very next to Chart Header.
• It will open the properties dialog. Under the Text section, you can add a heading in Line 1 and enable the Show option. Give the appropriate title of your chart and click on Apply button.
• To persist these changes made to the chart, you can click on the “Save Changes” button.

• The final Chart will look like below.

Insights

• 64% of participants mentioned that it was easy to buy the product, while 16% disagreed.
• 68% found it straightforward to locate what they were searching for, while 15% found it difficult.
• According to 70% of the respondents, the support team was proficient in taking care of their matter. Yet 13% did not agree.
• In summary, 68% of respondents were content with the website and would recommend it to others. 15% encountered complications while using it, and the remaining 15% had neither a positive nor negative opinion.

How to Improve Your Customer Effort Score?

Taking measures to enhance customer service is necessary to raise your Customer Effort Score.

The following tips can help you raise your customer effort rating:

• Pay attention to customer feedback and spot potential areas for customer service improvements.
• Invest in customer service and ensure your team handles customer issues proficiently.
• Use technology to simplify customer service procedures and ease customer interaction with your company.

FAQs:

What is the Customer Effort Score?

The Customer Effort Score indicates how satisfied and happy customers are with your business. It quantifies the effort consumers put in to receive what they want. It also gives a degree of customer satisfaction with the service.

Why is Customer Effort Score important?

This metric helps businesses understand how easily their customers can interact with them. The importance of measuring the Customer Effort Score is its ability to provide actionable insights. Insights into how well you are providing customer service.

Should Customer Effort Score be low or high?

A high customer effort score is desirable. It’s a sign that your customers are pleased with their interactions with your business. This means they can get what they need without struggling.

What is a good CES score for SaaS?

Depending on the industry, different SaaS products may have varying customer effort scores. A score of more than 6 out of 10 is generally considered good. It indicates that customers are pleased with the SaaS product.

Why is CES better than NPS?

CES offers more detailed insights into how difficult it is for customers to complete tasks or processes. CES also offers more accurate insights than NPS. It measures the actual effort customers put in rather than just their willingness to recommend.

Wrap Up

A Customer Effort Score is a valuable indicator that aids in gauging customer satisfaction. Additionally, you can pinpoint places where you can improve customer experience.

You must gauge your clients’ efforts if you want to raise the quality of your service. Because of this, businesses are employing the Customer Effort Score more frequently.

Your Customer Effort Score will be high if they are happy and satisfied with their experience. To improve your Customer Effort Score, you should focus on streamlining the customer experience. This is by providing clear and helpful customer service and proactively addressing customer issues.

To analyze your Customer Effort Score, use ChartExpo.

With ChartExpo, you can generate charts and graphs to analyze customer feedback. Thus, identify areas where you can improve customer service.

Net Promoter, NPS, NPS Prism and many other terms related to NPS are registered trademarks of Bain & Company Inc., Satmetrix Systems Inc., and Fred Reichheld.