I'm not done yet. LOL!
I remember 15 years ago, I was in a session with a bunch of big wigs from GE. These guys always asked the tough questions. They asked me how I knew that all of "their money" I was spending on "Ensuring Robust Execution" (ERE) was working. ERE is a set of training, tools, people and methods that strive to ensure products are safe, functional, performant and secure. I could have shown them a bunch of fancy engineering metrics my team used to continually monitor ERE performance but these guys have a 10 second attention span. Instead, I pointed them to our VP of Marketing who was responsible for surveying Net Promoter Score (NPS). He illustrated how our NPS was steadily increasing over a 4-year period and he said it was directly correlated to our product quality improvements.
Now I don't know Axiom's NPS. However, I have a 12 year history with Axiom. There is no question, absolutely no question in my mind, acoustical performance over this 12-year period has improved by leaps and bounds. Beyond just me, I have folks, who aren't into audio like I am at all, coming over to listen to my gear and they are learning that living with their gear ain't a good way to live. I have to admit this is a slow, grinding process on their end; it's not instant. But nonetheless, it is indicative of the brain comparing between multiple experiences and coming to a conclusion.
A practical person like myself would look at all this and say "Hey, whatever they are doing appears to be working." This includes Family of Curves and listening tests and who knows what else. How much of this can be attributed to listening tests vs. other efforts I don't know. But if Axiom stands by their listening tests, then they must be keeping score. Why else would a company spend money on something that doesn't work?
