Just a thought...

The SaaS business model is not built on acquiring everyone with a pulse - it never was and will never be.

It's built on retention, expansions, and referrals.

 

Retention, expansions, and referrals are built on Customer Success.

It's really that simple.

 

Here are the 7 changes you need to go through for a winning strategy:

 

1. Company-wide alignment

Customer Success results from building a great product, acquiring the right customers, and delivering world-class services.

Customer Success is a shared responsibility. It does not work if it is the sole responsibility of a single team or department. After all, the letter M in CSMs does not stand for magicians.

Put your customers at the centre of everything you do across the company and be obsessive about this. 

 

2. Working with meaningful data

You need to understand who your customers are, why they are here, what they are doing, their outcomes, and their actions. That requires collecting quantitative and qualitative data.

 

3. Building repeatable processes

The data enables you to identify the ideal customer persona (ICP) and understand the ideal customer journey. Scalable growth results from acquiring the former and replicating the latter over and over.

 

4. Closing the skills and knowledge gaps

Your customers need trusted advisors who help them navigate a stormy sea. They need someone with substantial subject expertise and problem-solving skills. Skip certifications and focus on acquiring the skills and knowledge to deliver results.

 

5. Improving your portfolio

You’ve probably heard that about 20% of customers account for 80% of revenue and profits.

The problem is, that you spend 80% of your time on the other 20%. You need to politely show bad-fit customers the door and ensure they are replaced with ICPs.

 

6. Understanding why customers really churn

No more treating of symptoms and no more discounts. Customers leave because they don’t get enough value. It’s your mission to find out where and why things are going south. Create a thorough report that is shared across the company every month.

 

7. Measuring customer outcomes

It does not matter how you are measuring Customer Success. All that matters is how your customers do it, what does success look like for them, what is their definition of success. Why? Because they are calling the shots. The CFO at your favourite customers’ company will not pay for usage and convenience. If you can’t prove significant ROI, you are out.

 

Customer Success is a revenue generating function. These are the foundational steps required for Customer Success to become the revenue engine it is meant to be.