Medtronic consistently analyzes open-ended NPS feedback to effect positive change for patients and HCPs working with the brand. That was the key takeaway from Relative Insight’s latest Spotlight Series webinar, which explored best-in-class NPS analysis.
Alban de Courville, Senior Manager, Business Insights, Medtronic Diabetes EMEA, shared examples of how he and his team act on insights from NPS surveys. He also took viewers through his team’s NPS journey — including how the ability to analyze free-text responses using Relative Insight has changed the structure of its NPS feedback program.
Liv Metcalf, Senior Account Director at Relative Insight, joined Alban to discuss Medtronic’s NPS program. Liv took attendees through Relative Insight’s platform, demonstrating why it empowers users to better understand survey feedback, as well as add value to their analysis.
Watch the webinar in full using the banner below, or read on for our bitesized summary of the session.
NPS feedback highlights importance of nurse visits and sustainability
Alban cited two examples where Medtronic had used NPS feedback to improve experiences for patients and HCPs.
Resuming face-to-face nurse visits
The first example involved feedback from nurses in one particular country. Prior to and during the Covid-19 pandemic, NPS among this group had been positive — between 20 and 40. However, in the period following the pandemic, this fell to below zero.
By analyzing nurses’ open-ended responses to its NPS survey and comparing them to previous surveys, a clear pattern emerged. Nurses were unhappy that Medtronic’s diabetes staff were not resuming in-person visits.
“The comments from nurses in this specific country were telling us: ‘Come and see us again! You are seeing our physicians again post-Covid, you are not seeing us. Come and see us’,” Alban said.
He added: “These comments from nurses asking us to see them again didn’t come from a question we had designed. It was purely from statistical analysis of the free-text field.”
Based on this feedback, Medtronic prioritized the resumption of nurse visits in this country. Over its next two NPS surveys, its score returned to previous positive levels.
Reduced packaging vital for diabetes patients
The second example focused on a longitudinal analysis of key themes within NPS survey responses. The topic of sustainability, particularly surrounding waste, emerged as a key NPS driver for the medical devices brand.
Using Relative Insight Heartbeat, Alban illustrated how the company tracked this theme within NPS feedback from both promoters and detractors.
He demonstrated how the subject of packaging initially became prominent in responses from promoters first in 2022. Through free-text analysis, it was clear that despite giving Medtronic NPS ratings of 9 or 10, this group were still unhappy with the size and number of boxes they were being sent.
Using a Heartbeat chart, Medtronic identified that this became a key talking point among detractors too by 2023. The country where this theme was trending had switched customers to scheduled delivery of diabetes medical devices. It became apparent that this had overwhelmed customers in some instances.
Alban explained: “We can see that it’s a rising trend. In some countries people with diabetes no longer need to order themselves, they have a scheduled delivery. That means there are many boxes coming to their home, and it’s in this country we have that comment coming up.
“We would never have thought to ask a question about the number of boxes diabetes patients were receiving at home.”
Medtronic’s diabetes NPS journey
To kick off his talk, Alban gave viewers an insight into the Medtronic diabetes team’s NPS journey.
He discussed how optimizing its NPS survey program had been an iterative process, highlighting that surveys were initially conducted on a quarterly basis and contained around 50 questions. However, this quickly led to survey fatigue, with response rates plummeting.
Incorporating Relative Insight into its survey analysis allowed Medtronic’s diabetes team to rethink its NPS program. With free-text analysis software able to identify key topics within open-ended responses as part of its program, the team no longer had to prompt patients and HCPs on certain aspects of its service using specific questions.
The ability to capture all relevant themes within responses, rather than splitting them into individual questions to aid manual analysis, enabled Alban and his team to streamline its NPS survey down to five questions. This led to a much higher response rate — and NPS feedback that is more actionable.
“With the help of Relative Insight, we only need to ask for satisfaction and comments,” Alban said. He continued: “We don’t need to ask all of these questions that create survey fatigue, meaning you get a much better response rate.”
Why use Relative Insight to analyze NPS feedback
To begin the webinar, Liv outlined the advantages of using Relative Insight to analyze survey open-ends. She highlighted the drawbacks of alternative methods of analyzing text data, noting that none of them quickly and effectively help you to understand why key business metrics are rising or falling.
Liv emphasized the role open-ended survey responses play in getting to the why:
“If you go to internal stakeholders and say NPS is falling in a certain region, their immediate question is going to be ‘why is that happening?’ If you aren’t looking at open-ended responses, you’re not going to be able to give them an answer.”
She also demonstrated how the platform can automate NPS analysis programs, such as automatically conducting analysis of key themes in responses for promoters and detractors.
Want to replicate how Medtronic has enhanced its NPS program? Speak to one of our experts now and find out how Relative Insight can provide pinpoint NPS analysis.
