CxXchange’s Post

Dear #CCOs, While many discussions in the industry tend to revolve around metrics like product usage and CSAT, successful CS Teams thrive on driving tangible results that directly impact the company's bottom line. Product usage and feature adoption, Health scores, NPS and CSAT can be a something that your CS Teams are focused on but they should not be their primary KPIs rather how much revenue they save (customer retention), how much revenue they generate (Expansions/Upsells or Referrals) should be their primary KPIs. These are KPIs which directly show your CS Teams value on your company's bottom line and not your NPS Score. Until next time, share what you are doing. What's working for you and what's not working? ……………………………………. First time seeing my posts? I’m on a mission to empower Customer Success. I post regularly about: ✅ Proactive Customer Success Mindset ✅ Customer Success Leadership ✅ Ways to Improve CS Operations 🔔Hit the bell to not miss a post 👩🏽🏫Want to improve your CS operations?- click the link in my profile #saas #customersuccess #customerretention

One thing that only some CSM are comfortable with is pushing back... Yes, you heard it right. The power dynamic between the customer and CSM is different. Or is it in our minds? If you keep this in mind, you can also change this in the meeting room! Don't get me wrong; this is not a power play, but it is simply owning the room and credibility. Excited to share some game-changing insights on measuring customer success! Cut through the noise by tailoring success to YOUR needs. Ask your clients: 🤔 "Between now and three months from now, what needs to be true for you and your team to call this partnership a success?" 🌟 "What is one thing you need to see from our platform/services to ensure your decision to sign up was right?" 💡 You are pushing for a reason 💪🏽 To define success together! You can only pave the way for meaningful outcomes and lasting partnerships if you and your customers are aligned! Don't shy away. If your client pushes back, stand firm. Reiterate that understanding their journey is critical to delivering value. #CustomerSuccess #Success #OKRs #KPIs"

Customer Success = Value Delivered, Not Churn Avoided. The hard truth? Customers leave when they no longer have a reason to stay. And guess what? That's on us. But here's the kicker — not all customers should stay. Focus on value alignment over keeping everyone happy. The best customers are those who grow with your product, not the ones who need constant babysitting. Retention at all costs leads to burnout and bad-fit customers. Start focusing on driving outcomes that matter, not just keeping them onboard for numbers. Be bold enough to let go of those who don’t align with your growth vision. ……………………………………. First time seeing my posts? I post regularly about: ✅ Customer Success Leadership ✅ Ways to Improve CS Operations ✅ Proactive Customer Success Mindset 🔔Hit the bell to not miss a post 👩🏽🏫Want to improve your CS operations?- visit https://successguardian.in #customersuccess #saas #cco 

𝟰/𝟱 𝗼𝗳 𝗖𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝗦𝘂𝗰𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝘁𝗲𝗮𝗺𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗪𝗥𝗢𝗡𝗚 𝗴𝗼𝗮𝗹𝘀.  We’re laser-focused on: 1️⃣ Feature adoption  2️⃣ Customer health scores (NPS, CSAT)  3️⃣ Scalability & efficiency But guess what? Customers don’t care about these internal metrics. Here’s the cold truth: They’re not here for your new features. They don’t care about your “health score” or how many check-ins you schedule. Customers want one thing and one thing only: business outcomes that impact their success. 👉 If every conversation, every QBR, every email isn't directly tied to solving their specific business problems, we’re failing. Think about it: Are we really enabling customers to reach their goals, or just checking off boxes on our side? Stop focusing on: • Dashboard lights  • Churn predictions  • NPS obsession Instead, start asking: 1. What tangible results are we driving for them?  2. How are we improving their bottom line?  3. Where can we create immediate value? Until our metrics match their success, we’re just pushing noise. Time to shift from OUR goals to THEIR outcomes. Agree or disagree? Drop your thoughts below! 👇 ……………………………………. First time seeing my posts? I post regularly about: ✅ Customer Success Leadership ✅ Ways to Improve CS Operations ✅ Proactive Customer Success Mindset 🔔Hit the bell to not miss a post 👩🏽🏫Want to improve your CS operations?- visit https://successguardian.in #customersuccess #saas #cco

I believe partnership leaders have a great opportunity to align themselves to the business’s retention and existing customer revenue growth strategies. It’s a key concern with today’s C-suite and especially in #SaaS where value needs delivered month in and month out. What partners bring is the additional offering to deliver that value. Either as an integration/product extending the capability or a service ensuring the product is being used to its potential.   However, to achieve this there needs to be a bit of a mindset shift. That shift needs to move from only thinking about net new revenue partners are bringing in but to how partners can bring value into the org and especially throughout the customer life-cycle journey. But it’s not just a shift in thinking from the partnership teams but also how for example how the customer success teams think.   The CSM needs to be open and willing to work with partners ensuring they know what true customer success looks like and work with them to create the right solutions and services that helps with customer success. Trust needs to be formed and accounts traditionally guarded need to be opened to the partner network.   A solid relationship between customer success and the partnership team presents to me a real tangible strategy to help with the concern of retention and existing customer revenue growth. #partnerecosystem #customersuccess #partnerstrategy

Let's Cut the Fluff: Time to Get Real, Customer Success Pros! Your customers don’t care about your company’s legacy, the shiny awards you've collected, or the latest flashy features you’ve added to your product. They’re focused on one thing: RESULTS. If you’re  1. not making them money,  2. saving them money,  3. boosting their efficiency, or keeping them out of trouble you’re irrelevant. They care about real-world results. So, if your success metrics aren't aligned with your customers' bottom line, you're doing it wrong. Customer Success isn’t about making friends, it’s about making a difference. Let’s stop dancing around the issue and start delivering the goods. Real value. Real results. ……………………………………. First time seeing my posts? I post regularly about: ✅ Customer Success Leadership ✅ Ways to Improve CS Operations ✅ Proactive Customer Success Mindset 🔔Hit the bell to not miss a post 👩🏽🏫Want to improve your CS operations?- visit https://successguardian.in #customersuccess #saas #cco 

Should a Customer Success Manager be a director of orchestra? Or is it better to wear many hats? 🤔 After some quite insightful conversations we had due to the post of Prof Services VS Customer Success, I believe it is important to deep dive a bit more on how far should a CSM go in the relationship with customers. If interested, check the post here 👉 https://lnkd.in/dj92tPJJ 1️⃣ How technical a CSM needs to be? The chat with Ian Fairclough highlighted that some product companies tend to have domain expertise in their CS resources. Jake Morgan was even going further, indicating that some organizations put all post-sales roles under the same umbrella (even with similar compensation metrics). It all ends up the value we are providing to customers. 2️⃣ Should the CSM be resolutive or orchestrate other resources? Following previous comment, Volney Koudsi Faustini was seeing an increase in TAM roles due to their tendency to be more resolutive in one call than a CSM that orchestrates resources. The bottom line was again the value seen by customers. 3️⃣ Company complexity impacts CS skills? I loved the comment from Antonio García Hernández on considering CSMs the director of the circus. Further from the funny comparison, it is clear that the more complex our company is, the more services we are providing to customers. Therefore, customers value having one person acting as the one facilitating and optimizing the usage of that myriad of resources. 4️⃣ Is this about Customer Experience? Interestingly, several comments from David, Antonio and Ainoa introduced how much this is related to CX. I believe that this topic deserves a separated post, but I love how we are all providing value to customer with different angles. With all said, it is clear to me that there are many approaches, but all of them have customer in the center. Depending your company, the product, the market, .... there are plenty of ways to organize your CS team. But you north star should not change: your customer. Willing to continue the conversation? I will be happy to! #customersuccess #customerengagement #customersatisfaction #customerexperience #csm

The case for Customer Success is simple: ❤️ Time to Value is much shorter with great onboarding ❤️ Lifetime Value increases when customers get results ❤️ Upselling is at least 5 times cheaper than getting new customers ❤️ Successful customers refer you to new customers It's common sense. And it's been proven time and time again. So why is it so hard to convince some executives and counterparts that Customer Success is the second engine of growth of the business? Because CS folks try to overcomplicate it. Some of the cases I've seen people put together: 🥵 Use stupid jargon 🥵 Have too many metrics 🥵 Don't offer a cost/benefit picture 🥵 Go too deep into programmatic stuff 🥵 Lack of clarity on how the program impacts important goals I am not surprised some executives don't get it. If you want your leadership team to buy into Customer Success, you have to tell a more compelling story. Here's what a killer Business Case for CS can look like: 1- What value will we drive? 🤑 We will create X% more Revenue. 2- How are you going to do it? 🚀 We will Decrease TTV, Increase Retention and Create Upsell Opportunities to Increase LTV, and we will generate Referrals. 3- How much is it going to cost? ⭐️ Budget for the investments, calculation on Cost of Retaining Customer and trend over time showing the investment scales. 4- What happens if we don't do it? 🤯 $X Cancellations, $X Downgrades, Reputation Challenges. 5- Appendix: - Segmentation strategy - Team Structure - Execution Plan - Timelines That's all you need to drive awareness and buy-in from your leadership team. You can shape this narrative to fit each of your executive personas, ie. what do you choose to highlight if you are addressing the CFO, vs. the CRO? Let's make sure CS is seen and valued by telling the right story! 📥 If you're interested in building or scaling your Customer Success team, consider joining 8k+ CS Professionals who read my weekly newsletter on how to build and scale a CS Team [sign up in the comments section]. #customersuccess #CSM #customerexperience #B2BGrowth #NRR

Customer Success is not Sales 2.0. And treating it like that is destroying your growth. When CS becomes primarily a sales channel: 🥵 Usage drops 🥵 Results flattens 🥵 Trust evaporates 🥵 Churn accelerates Customers see through the "help" that's really a pitch. And if the CSM is doing sales... Then who is CSMing? Nobody. The irony? Companies pushing CS to sell more make LESS money. It's kind of obvious: - Successful customers renew - Successful customers expand - Successful customers refer you When you lead with value, you get more value back. This doesn’t mean CS teams can’t play a strategic role in growth by: - Identify opportunities (CSQLs) - Be compensated for expansions - Track NRR as a north star metric It means that the main goal should remain to make customers successful. - Ready to focus on the stuff that moves the needle? ✨ Join thousands of other CS leaders learning how to build teams that drive value by subscribing to my newsletter. Discover broader horizons today! (link below) #CustomerSuccess #RevOps #CustomerExperience #CSM #SaaS

At some point over the years, we began to lose the essence of the CS role, focusing only on sales rather than on partnership, problem-solving, and client success. Yes, sales should and in my opinion MUST be a KPI for CS, but they need be the result of the work, not the only driver. Sales should be tied to other KPIs that prioritize client success, this is how companies achieve the sustainable growth they seek.