According to The Customer Success Association, the role of a Customer Success Team is, “To increase sustainable proven value for both the customers and your company.” Customer Success Managers (CSMs) fill the void between sales and support. The role is extremely common in most Software as a Service (SaaS) organizations but is also found within B2B, B2C, product and/or other service-based companies.
What does a Customer Success Manager do, typically?
Support Customer Onboarding
Customer Success Managers begin by understanding the customer’s needs and determining how their product or service can help meet those customer needs. This process includes learning about the company and strategizing a few “quick wins” for the customer.
Drive Customer Retention
CSMs understand that the cost of bringing on a new customer is more expensive than retaining existing ones. They work to stay ahead of customer needs and work hard to offer new insights, strategies, and functionality.
Spur Customer Account Growth
If a customer is consistently attaining their goals with your product or service, they may want to upgrade their account with new features, services, functionality, or licenses. This is another role for the CSM. Using their deep knowledge of the customer’s needs, they’d be able to recommend expansion options that would have the most impact.
Encourage Advocacy from Your Customers
If your customers have been successful with your product or service, they’re likely to recommend you to others in your network. Successful CSMs generate new leads by creating trusted, long-term relationships with their customers.
Customer Success is Not:
Customer Support
Customer Support is reactive. Customer Success Managers do not help users fix software or functionality issues once they arise – leave those responsibilities to Tech or Customer Support teams. The role of Customer Success Managers is to be proactive: anticipating problems and ensuring that when problems that do occur, they won’t happen again in the future.
Only Account Management
Traditional Account Management roles focus on cross-selling and upselling products or services – even if those recommendations don’t make sense for the customer. While the Customer Success Management approach still relies on expansion packages and cross-selling, add-ons are only recommended when they align with the customer’s needs and goals.
Important metrics for a Customer Success Manager
- 24-hour onboarding
- Churn (customer retention)
- Sessions Per Day
- Net Promoter Score (NPS)
- Expansion package add-ons (upsell)
