Customer Effort Score (CES)
A metric that measures how easy it was for a customer to accomplish a specific task or resolve an issue, typically on a 1-7 scale from "Very Difficult" to "Very Easy."
Also known as: CES
Why customer effort score (CES) matters
Research shows that reducing customer effort is a stronger predictor of loyalty than delighting customers. Customers who find your product or support easy to use are far more likely to stay, expand, and refer others.
CES is most valuable when measured after specific interactions - completing a task, using a feature, or contacting support. It gives you targeted, actionable feedback about friction points.
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How to Track in KISSmetrics
Trigger CES surveys in KISSmetrics after key interactions. Track the score as an event property tied to the specific feature or action. Compare CES across different product areas to prioritize UX improvements.
Common Mistakes
- -Only measuring CES for support interactions, missing product friction
- -Surveying too broadly instead of after specific tasks
- -Not acting on the results - CES is only valuable if you fix the friction it reveals
Pro Tips
- +Combine CES with NPS for a complete picture: CES shows tactical friction, NPS shows strategic satisfaction
- +Measure CES at onboarding milestones to identify where new users struggle most
- +Track CES trends after product changes to validate UX improvements
Related Terms
Net Promoter Score (NPS)
A customer loyalty metric measured by asking "How likely are you to recommend us?" on a 0-10 scale. Scores range from -100 to +100.
Customer Health Score
A composite metric combining multiple signals like product usage, support tickets, NPS responses, and payment history to predict customer retention or churn risk.
Onboarding Completion Rate
The percentage of new users who complete all steps in your defined onboarding flow. A leading indicator of activation and long-term retention.
Churn Rate
The percentage of customers or revenue lost over a given period. Customer churn measures account losses; revenue churn measures dollar losses.
Further Reading
Support Contact Is a Behavioural Event, Not a Helpdesk Statistic
A support contact is the highest-effort signal a customer sends you, and it usually lives in a system that cannot be joined to anything. Contact is a good sign. Contact then silence is not.
Customer Success Analytics: Health Scores That Work
Customer success analytics turns product behavior into health scores, expansion signals, and churn warnings. How to pick the inputs and act on them early.
Why Your A/B Testing Programme Plateaus After a Year
A programme without a thesis produces wins that do not compound. Forty tests later you have forty facts and no model of your customer.
The Churn Prevention Workflow: Detecting and Saving At-Risk Customers Automatically
Build an automated churn prevention workflow that detects at-risk users from behavioral signals and triggers intervention sequences across email, in-app, and CS.
Build your business intelligence layer for free.
Record the response as a property on the person and every report splits by it, so you can see what promoters do differently rather than watching a number move.