Jason Munk

Love these tips from Daphne to stop CSM’s being reactive and start being proactive

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🕒 A Day in the Life of a CSM (Because We Make It Look Easy... But It’s Not) 8:00 AM – Inbox Battle Royale Wake to a burn fire. Reply to emails. Respond to the same question… for the 5th time this month. ("Yes, you can find that in the Help Center!"). Inbox zero? Not even close. 9:00 AM – Firefighter Mode Urgent escalation. The customer suddenly remembers their renewal is next week, and now it’s an “emergency.” Cue panic mode. Remember to breath! 10:00 AM – 3rd Internal Meeting of the Day Discuss KPIs and dashboards with teams that use a completely different set of metrics. Translation mode: activated. 11:00 AM – Reporting Overload Your CRM is somehow missing 50% of the data you need. The spreadsheet is missing the other 50%. Guess who's combining them manually? 12:00 PM – Lunch... or Not You thought you had 30 minutes to eat. Wrong. Surprise meeting with the product team to discuss why Feature X isn’t working for customers in 3 different time zones. Bye, sandwich 🥪. 1:00 PM – Customer Sync Call Walk the customer through a roadmap that’s 90% wishlist and 10% reality. Smile and nod while they ask for features that won’t be released until 2027. 2:00 PM – CRM Admin Black Hole Update your customer records, health scores, and next steps. Find out half the data is outdated, and none of it matches what your customer actually said on the call. 3:00 PM – Renewal Strategy Meeting Plot the customer’s renewal. Build a case for expansion. Then find out they’ve been secretly trialling a competitor for weeks. Fun times. 4:00 PM – Post-Fire Drill Damage Control The customer escalation from 9 AM? Still on fire 🔥. You're now a therapist, product expert, and contract negotiator all at once. 5:00 PM – Last-Minute Follow-Ups Send out 3 follow-up emails, fix a PowerPoint deck, and add 6 more tasks to tomorrow’s to-do list. Oh, and you’ll still have to smile while doing it all again. It’s 8 hours of chaos, spreadsheets, and deep breaths—and somehow, we still make it look easy. 😅 Ready for a better way of CSM-ing? 🚀 Join 11K+ Customer Success Professionals who read my weekly newsletter for insights on how to skip the rat race and focus on delivering value for customers. [link below] #DayInTheLife #CSM #RevOps #CustomerSuccess #CustomerRetention

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If you're a CSM you should be learning from your sales counterparts. There are just things that are just second nature to a salesperson that a CSM may not even think about doing. My favorite thing that all sales folks do, they secure the next meeting. There's none of this "Oh I'll send you a link to my Calendly" nonsense. They make sure to leave time at the end of the call to summarize and pull up calendars to book the next meeting. I cannot tell you how many times I've had a renewal meeting with a CSM and when I ask when the next meeting is I get one of 2 responses: 1) "Oh I sent them my link and I am waiting for them to book" OR "I sent them a few times and I am waiting for them to get back to me" OR 2) Our next regularly scheduled call is on XYZ Neither of those is acceptable to me. I'm sure you're thinking, "But Kristi, number 2 is fine, they have a meeting on the calendar." WRONG. They have their next recurring cadence of engagement on the calendar which should be used for strategy sessions or adoption support, project follow up etc. but those are not the commercial diven meetings I am looking for and here is why. 1) The CSM or the customer usually has an agenda for that meeting and it should be regarding their value realization and be more strategic in nature. 2) It's usually not soon enough - I'm not waiting 3 weeks before we chat about moving things to the next stage on this upsell/renewal/expansion. Where is the sense of urgency? 3) The right stakeholders are not always part of that regular recurring meeting. Now are there exceptions ... Of course, not everything is black or white. ▶ Maybe the next meeting is later that week or even next week - This MAY meet an acceptable timeline to advance the discussion ▶ The customer has specifically asked to use the next meeting that's on the calendar to continue the discussion **caveat being that the time to that meeting is appropriate** ▶ You work directly with the decision maker/budget holder and they are in all meetings So yes, there are exceptions. But generally speaking, if you are the CSM, and you're having commercial conversations with your customer it's appropriate to ask for their availability and lock in the next meeting to keep the conversation going. Sorry if this hits a nerve, but this is my personal pet peeve. Am I wrong?

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CSM, get out of the hamster wheel before you burn out. ❌ Stop fire-fighting ❌ Stop with check-in calls ❌ Stop reacting to your inbox ❌ Stop taking support queries ❌ Stop ineffective repetitive tasks ❌ Stop solving for this month's number ❌ Stop emailing unresponsive contacts ❌ Stop only prioritising in-month renewals ❌ Stop manually doing what should be automated A ton of hard work. Very little to show for it. You'll never get out of the rat race if you keep working this way. Here's a different and better way of CSM-ing: ✅ Establish your customers' expected outcomes ✅ Build a Success Plan from day one ✅ Ensure they have the right set-up ✅ Hold customers accountable ✅ Report on and share results ✅ Ask if they intend to renew ✅ Monitor leading indicators ✅ Pick up the phone ✅ Multi-thread Proactive, strategic and consultative. 1000x better. If reading this makes you feel ashamed because you don't know where to start or overwhelmed because your current work situation is too chaotic to create the time for this, you're not alone. Thousands of CSMs feel exactly the same way. I know what you're thinking: -> You can't afford to stop right now -> You don't have time to make changes -> You only need to weather the storm and things will get better I've been there too. But these are the excuses that are holding you back. Nobody is coming to save you. You need to save yourself. So here's my advice: 🛑 Stop everything 🛑 Book 2 days "OOO" in your calendar. And do these 3 exercises: 1- Create a Calendar Blueprint: Set up a separate calendar from your current one. You'll use this to design a new calendar blueprint for yourself. You should add every single thing you need to do proactively in this calendar, it's the baseline for you to start changing the make-up of your working day. 📆 I'll link the one I designed for CSMs in the comments. 2- Book of Business Review: Do a full review of your customers and place them into one of the 4 buckets of priority. This way you can decide which customers to pay attention to and which ones to de-prioritise at this time. 🧰 Engagement prioritisation framework linked in the comments. 3- Calendar Planning Book or delete meetings based on customers you need to prioritise over the coming 6-8 weeks. Craft unique messages to send to these customers with compelling reasons why they should attend. 🤖 Use the T.A.V.U method I shared in the newsletter a few weeks ago + ChatGPT can help you be efficient here. Do these 3 things and I promise you that you'll: - get better results - transform your work-life - improve your mental health Create the space. 📥 If you're interested in improving your Customer Success skills, consider joining 10k+ CS Professionals who read my weekly newsletter on how to build and scale a CS Team [sign up in the comments section]. #csm #customersuccess #customerexperience #revops #saas

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In a recent discovery call with a VP of Rev Ops, I had a breakthrough moment. Despite initial reservations, a shift occurred when I prioritized understanding over outcomes. I shared my genuine objectives: - Identifying fixable problems - Assessing problem severity - Evaluating if our solution addresses the issue By signaling readiness to walk away if objectives weren't met, trust blossomed, and the VP opened up about challenges. Key takeaway: Detach from outcomes, focus on customer pain. Prioritizing customer needs over sales goals helps: - Build trust - Foster open communication - Ensure alignment - Provide value, even if it means parting ways For those who've experienced similar breakthroughs, share your stories in the comments! #CustomerCentric #DiscoveryCalls #SalesMindset #OrbitShift

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CSMs that reject the "conventional playbook" are 100x more successful. I'm dead serious. Most CSMs don't fail because they are not compliant. They fail because they're too busy "maintaining relationships" and "checking boxes" instead of driving business outcomes. I've seen dozens of compliant CSMs that ended up in PIPs. Let's bust a few myths: 🔴 NPS has ZERO correlation with renewals 🔴 Cookie-cutter QBRs demonstrate no value 🔴 Weekly check-ins drive no outcomes whatsoever 🔴 Health Scores built on intuition don't accurately predict risk These "best practices" are lies. And they are killing your ability to be a great CSM. While you're sending "check-in" emails, Top CSMs are: 1️⃣ Helping customers crystalise their goals 2️⃣ Advising on the key metrics that matter 3️⃣ Building detailed success plans 4️⃣ Forging strategic partnerships 5️⃣ Ensuring accountability 6️⃣ Testing and iterating 7️⃣ Communicating ROI 8️⃣ Multi-threading The game has changed. We're no longer here to make customers "happy". We're no longer here to make health scores "green". We're here to make customers successful. We're here to drive revenue growth. Reject these silly "vanity" metrics. Chase the stuff that is going to have a real impact. 📥 Want to become a great CSM? Consider joining 11.5k+ CS Professionals who read my weekly newsletter on how to build and scale a CS Team [sign up in the comments section]. #csm #customersuccess #customerledgrowth #CX #revops

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🚨 The Silent Crisis In Customer Success 🚨 Most CSMs aren't meeting customers as often as we think. Here’s the reality: 😱 Many CSMs have fewer than two customer meetings a day 😱 Almost half of scheduled calls are rescheduled 😱 Email is their main mode of communication This isn't the CSM's fault. Why is this happening? - Firefighting takes away planned engagement time - Unclear value proposition for customer meetings - Lack of support from marketing-led initiatives - Overwhelmed by internal meetings - No automated meeting reminders CSMs are trapped in an environment that limits their effectiveness. 🔥 What successful CS teams are doing differently: - Use smart health scores to prioritise - Automate pre-meeting reminders to ensure attendance - Trigger touchpoints using health scores - Track engagement as a key indicator - Limit internal meetings to a maximum of 30% of their time Here’s the truth: Customers don't churn instantly. They drift away during the silences. Worried this might be happening to your team? Analyse data from the last 90 days: - Check how many calls your CSMs have logged - Divide by total CSMs and 90 days for the daily stat - Compare with their calendars from the last 30 days The difference might surprise you!

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9 things Sales Leaders should stop doing in 2024 1. Being solely tactical 2. Dodging use of math 3. Befriending your reps 4. Opposing RevOps hires 5. Resisting remote working 6. Communicating infrequently 7. Avoiding tough conversations 8. Focusing only on team morale 9. Being penny-wise & pound foolish What else should we add to this list?

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I appreciate these points.

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Stop settling for bad CS jobs—ask these questions! Just because they say it’s CS doesn’t mean it is. Last week, I interviewed a CSM currently at a startup that does everything wrong when it comes to CS. Everything, we talk about here on LI every day until we're sick of it 🤢 This CSM was desperate for a way out, but afraid to quit because of the shaky job market. 😬 Sound familiar? My skin crawls knowing that in 2024, companies like this still exist. But here’s the harsh reality: they do. Some companies out there are posting CS roles that are support positions disguised as something they’re not. They talk a big game, act like they’ve got a "well-oiled" CS department, but behind the scenes? 🚨 It's a chaotic mess.🚨 𝗧𝗼 𝗮𝗹𝗹 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗷𝗼𝗯 𝘀𝗲𝗲𝗸𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗻𝗮𝘃𝗶𝗴𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘀𝗽𝗮𝗰𝗲: ✋🏽 𝗦𝘁𝗼𝗽 𝗴𝗲𝘁𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗱𝘂𝗽𝗲𝗱! You deserve better. You deserve to work for a company that respects CS and sets you up for success, not failure. Here’s the good news: not every company is like that. ✅ There are CEOs and leaders who “get” Customer Success. 🙌🏽 To you, I say: THANK YOU! Your efforts are what’s driving this industry forward. You understand that CS isn’t just a “nice-to-have,” it’s a business growth engine. ❌ To those that don't? Well, you’re not just hurting your company; you’re damaging your brand and reputation. But let's get back to YOU, the job seeker. You don’t have to fall into this trap again. 👇🏽 Here are some questions you can ask during your next interview to suss out if a company knows their stuff: How many accounts does a CSM handle? • Who does the CS team report to? • How do you invest in the growth of your CS team? • How does CS, Product, and Engineering collaborate? • How does your company define the role of Customer Success? • What happens when a customer isn’t a good fit for your product? • What indicator do you look at to see that your CS team is performing? • Give an example of how a CSM helped shape or influence company strategy? • Describe a time when CS had to push back on Sales for overpromising to a customer? • What’s your customer churn rate, and what’s being done to improve it? • How are customer feedback and issues escalated and resolved? • Walk me through your CS process from onboarding to retention? • What tools are in place to support the CS team’s work? • What is the average tenure of a CS team member? • How do you measure the success of your CSMs? Ask these, and you'll quickly know if you're walking into a well-structured CS department or a dumpster fire. 🚒🔥 👉🏽 What’s the worst CS experience you’ve ever had at a company? What other questions can you ask to test the CS maturity level? Drop it in the comments! #customersuccess #saas #startups #careercoaching  #CS #CSM #SuccessHacks #customersuccessmanager #lessonsfromanewvp  

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The best "cheat codes" every AE should know: 1. 1:1s with your boss. Approach them strategically. Proactively share format and content. Biggest deals you need support on. Challenges you need help with. Forecast for the month, quarter, etc. Wins. 2. Perception. Performance is your fire. How you're perceived internally (aka your brand) is the water or gas that gets dumped on your fire. Attitude, how you show up, handle change, communicate, matters. Hold yourself to a high bar. Two levels above where you're currently at. 3. Document everything. Take the time to write down your own sales playbook. Every strategy, process and template you have. Store it on your personal computer. The value of this over time is immeasurable. I can't state this enough. 4. Problems are a good thing. Anytime there's a problem that's an opportunity to solve it, improve it, and add value. Some of the biggest opportunities I've gotten in my career came because I dove head first into problems and helped move the business forward. Startups always have problems. Don't be the negative person. 5. Time management. Block Monday mornings every week. Don't go to meetings if they're not worth your time. Most things can be solved async. Make meetings 15 to 20 mins. Sometimes you need a whole week of no meetings to catch up, get organized and do deep work. Don't feel bad for saying no to people. They'll understand. 6. External coaching. Up level by listening to podcasts, taking courses and building an external network. Don't rely on your company for everything. Even if they're doing a great job get the perspectives and strategies of other people for a significant edge. What would you add to this list? - Mike G 👉 Join 5,000+ sellers getting my (free) sales newsletter here: https://lnkd.in/gwQVvVBK

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People that care about UX and productivity for sales people: SDR Managers (god bless you wonderful folks). I do find that most direct managers in Sales aren't polling their employees--especially AE's to find out what's not working, what they are putting up with and not complaining about. There are tons of tools that sales folks are buying on their own dime like Scratchpad, Superhuman, etc. We all care about "giving developers the right tools to stay in flow".. but your revenue team? Sure, leaders need our forecasting tools and enablement systems (maybe)--but ask your team "what sucks about this CRM layout, how does thing work on your mobile device, what things are getting in your way, how much time do you spend clicking around poorly designed tooling interfaces---and what would move the needle for you". As an AE-centric leader, i'm working to put things in place that sure--make folks more productive--but that they don't hate using. What say you? whats sucks in your world? what tools do you buy on your own to deal with your day? or even how should the world work for a day-to-day SDR/AE/Account Manager, etc

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Hey CS Leaders: Customers don't want empathy. - They want to not have problems to empathize with. SVP of CS reaches out to me. - Sends CSAT survey - Get's 0s across the board - Get's my quick feedback too - Asks if I can have a call to explain - I say no, we have been through this - Nothing has changed for the better - Another call is a complete waste of time Then I get an email from my team - We've been waiting a month - To get answers on an open case - So I ask this SVP of CS for his help - He asks again for me to get on a call - To "explain my customer experience" - To "evaluate ways to better serve clients" I responded: - I don't want a call - To explain this again - For at least the 10th time - I just want this case resolved - Is that too much to ask them for? Case is resolved in 24 hours GREAT! BUT........ Do I have to email the SVP of CS every time my team can't get an answer from his team? And do I have to explain to him why I'm dissatisfied? He wants me to take time to explain the problem. Here it is: - Their "system is broken" - They don't track case resolution - Or don't make effort to improve it - Their CS team is very poorly trained - And/or not held accountable in any way - And/or they're immensely under-resourced *My best guess is they don't want to spend the money to have more CS reps to resolve issues faster, nor to improve their processes, systems, reports and metrics. There's really no other explanation for lack of response. 1. Poor systems 2. Lack of training 3. Zero accountability 4. Insufficient resources If we have to have our customers explain this to us on a Zoom call we're miles behind the curve. ✌️

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Great insight, Mark Siciliano, MBA! 🔥 Week 4 brings it home with a powerful takeaway: referrals are not about luck—they’re about intention. For everyone scrolling, here’s the essence of Mark’s advice: 🔎 Curate with Care: Not every satisfied customer is a referral jackpot. Target accounts where your product has deep traction, and CS has strong connections. Go for quality over quantity. 🎯 Get Specific: Don’t throw vague asks into the ether! Equip your CS team with detailed referral profiles, pain points solved, and success stories. The clearer you ask, the stronger the referral. 🤝 Protect the Relationship: Over-asking for referrals? Recipe for burnout. Keep it thoughtful and occasional—relationships first, referrals second. Referrals aren’t magic. Equip, target, and build those pipeline connections strategically! 👏 #RevenueEnablement #CustomerSuccess #B2BSales #PipelineBuilding #Referrals

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Revenue pros need to get ahead of the renewal conversation. Don’t take your renewals for granted. Instead: (1) Understand what’s going on with the business. Where are they winning and where are they struggling? (2) Demonstrate the impact you’ve had on their business. Make the case for renewal plain and simple. (3) Bring a point of view to the renewal conversation. This may mean restructuring to find an agreement that works for everyone. How are you getting ahead of renewals?

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I feel for SDR's in 2024. Why? Outbound has become really difficult...and sales leaders don't seem to be helping with targeting 😕 I have been 💣 for weeks by a a ton of enterprise-grade software SDRs. I applaud the work they are putting in, but there is a major problem: Viewpost is a 50 person growth stage company. We don't need nor could we make use of an enterprise ERP, system orchestration platforms, or one of a hundred things that hit my inbox and voicemail. I've started responding to SDR's with a simple note telling them that I appreciate their tenacity, but we aren't ICP. I've been surprised by the positive response. Sales leaders: spend a ton of time on targeting. Batting averages will rise and you'll avoid burning your SDR's out 🙌

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31 mistakes every CSM makes: Poor time management.  Ignoring the competition. Not following up regularly. Lack of strategic planning. Skipping onboarding steps.  Being too reactive to issues. Over-relying on automation. Ignoring customer feedback. Avoiding difficult conversations. Not aligning with customer goals. Not leveraging data and analytics. Not seeking continuous improvement. Over-promising and under-delivering. Not keeping up with product updates. Not preparing adequately for meetings. Focusing only on high-touch customers. Not documenting customer interactions. Not setting measurable success metrics. Not listening actively to customer needs. Neglecting to personalise communication. Underestimating the importance of training. Not understanding the customer’s business. Failing to coordinate with other departments. Neglecting to celebrate customer milestones. Not setting clear expectations with customers. Assuming the customer’s definition of success. Not seeking feedback on their own performance. Reacting rather than proactively managing accounts. Ignoring potential upsell and cross-sell opportunities. Failing to advocate for the customer within the company. Not building strong relationships with key stakeholders. Want to avoid them? Sign up for my newsletter. 📥 Join 10k+ CS Professionals who read my newsletter on how to build and scale a CS Team [sign up in the comments section]. #csm #revops #customerexperience #gtm #customersuccess

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CSMs: My customers are disengaged😢 Also CSMs: Hi, it’s me, let’s book time. 👍🏻 I recently received this email from a CSM that stopped me in my tracks (and not for a good reason). It was a 4 liner saying: - I am your CSM - Let’s talk And I was baffled at how little effort this person went through to get my attention. Even GenAI would do a better job, and trust me… I’ve been getting some really poor GenAI messages 😂 There’re 3 things wrong with this email: - Doesn’t grab my attention - Doesn’t position the value of the CSM - Isn’t tailored to what I am trying to achieve or where I am in my journey as a new customer A few bits of context: - I am a new customer and I never talked to their team before as I bought completely touchlessly. This is my first human experience with this brand. - I have already completed my basic set up in the system and have integrated to 2 other systems. This CSM had a bunch of information at their disposal to write a message that would make me want to engage. Not to mention that a quick LinkedIn search would have brought them to this page and they would have learned a lot about me and my use case. But they didn’t use any information. A much better version of it would be: “Hi Daphne, It’s Jenny here from [company]. I see that you have hit the ground running with your set up and have already set up your [feature] and integrated to [tool 1 &2], well done! I will be your Customer Success Manager, my job is to make sure you see results with your subscription. I help my customers with: - outcome 1 - outcome 2 - outcome 3 I would love to schedule a 15 mins chat with you to understand your goals and connect you with all the resources you need to crush your targets this year!” I would have answered this email. I didn’t answer the one I got. So here’s the lesson: If your customers are not responding to your emails, there’s a chance you are not writing compelling messages. Take 10 minutes to write a good email instead of copying and pasting something generic. A machine gun approach isn’t going to help you get engagement. 📥 If you're interested in Customer Success, consider joining 9k+ CS Professionals who read my weekly newsletter on how to build and scale a CS Team [sign up in the comments section]. #csm #customersuccess #customerengagement #revops #saas

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