Aito members have been told there is a “big opportunity” for growth if they can nudge up their Net Promoter Scores (NPS) by just a few percentage points.
During the presentation of the 11th Aito Travel Insights report for 2025, operators were told they should be capturing NPS data and analysing it in order to expand their customer database and repeat business.
The report surveyed nearly 14,000 responses in total from customers of 37 companies – tour operators, travel agencies and tourist board partners – within The Specialist Travel Association (Aito) and was carried out by customer data and insights company Spike.
Spike director Jon Walton said NPS offered a way for operators to grow in 2025.
He said: “NPS has such a strong correlation to repeat purchases and growth. If you are not capturing it you should be. For a lot of investors, it’s one of the top five statistics they are looking at.”
The average NPS score in the Insight Report across all Aito companies was 67.1, up from 64.8 in 2023, and down on 2023’s 69.3. Any score over 50 is regarded as good and 70 is seen as excellent.
Walton explained that customers who give lower scores for companies of between zero and six are known as ‘detractors’, and could give negative reports about a company, while ‘passives’ are those who score seven or eight and could be booking with other companies, and ‘promoters’, who will promote the business to family and friends, score nine or 10.
Across the survey respondents, the results worked out as 72% promoters, 23% passives and 5% detractors for Aito businesses, said Walton.
He insisted that moving lower scoring clients, such as ‘passives’, to higher scoring ‘promoters’, could make a big difference to a company.
“This is a big opportunity. If you can move your NPS score by three percentage points you can move your repeat purchase score by three percentage points,” said Walton.
He suggested companies start by trying to win back detractors. “You need to have someone jumping on that, finding out what the problems are to really understand and win them back,” he said.
As well as ensuring ‘promoters’ are incentivised to encourage them to refer the company, he similarly urged firms to find out why ‘passives’ are not scoring more highly. “Look at why they gave that score, eyeball it,” he said.
Sam Clark, managing director of Aito operator Experience Travel Group, agreed: “If you drill into it, there is almost always something that went wrong before they travelled. This is often the bit you can affect quite easily. We look at why they have given that score.”
He added: “Detractors are interesting and useful because they will tell you everything; these people can give you key bits about where you are going wrong.”
Experience Travel Group received a NPS score of 77 in the Aito report but has a score of 87 from clients in post-trip surveys.
Clark said the company’s NPS had risen as a result of changing which survey company it used and encouraging more clients to fill in feedback questionnaires.
Journey Latin America managing director Sarah Bradley said nurturing customer relationships was a vital part of creating strong NPS scores.
“You have to make the most of the opportunities you have to build that relationship and establish that trust at the beginning,” she said, adding: “Travel is such an emotional purchase, you spend a lot of time getting people excited. There is lots we can do as operators to enhance that journey and that relationship.”