Growth Molecules™’s Post

I'm so excited to be a new contributor to the ChurnZero Fighting Churn Blog! My first post is all about the seven fundamentals you should have in place before you actually press “go” on your digital customer success strategy. 1. Automation platform 2. Segmentation & personas 3. Permission to contact 4. Customer journey map(s) 5. Understand the current state 6. CSM activity analysis 7. Company-wide communication inventory Nailing these prerequisites BEFORE you start building digital campaigns will help ensure you don't end up with a big mess of random automation firing at your customers. #digitalcustomersuccess #digitalcs #gettingstarted #fundamentals

Who do your Buyers Trust? Their peers and colleagues. Not your fancy marketing slides and website. Why capture Customer Voice? Gather actionable insights, best practices, and success strategies directly from your most engaged and successful customers. These customer advocates can provide invaluable guidance on how to effectively onboard, adopt, and expand the use of your solution. Understand their specific challenges, goals, and the steps they took to achieve success. These conversations can uncover the most effective tactics and provide a roadmap for other customers to follow. And Leverage & Activate Customer Voice in these ways: 😍 Support Demand Generation and pump fuel into a campaign 😍Drive customer expansion efforts 😍Reinforce thought leadership 😍Awards & recognition programs 😍Sales Proof Points - capture customer voice during/after onboarding 😍Drive advocacy through Referrals 😍Customer and industry conferences 😍Engage your CAB throughout the year  😍Community and Peer to Peer Engagement 😍Showcase your Subject Matter Experts 😍Welcome new customers to help build competitive edge in market 😍Sales Win-Wire So why are we still seeing content that is NOT authentic that is NOT your customers voice used for demand gen, growth and lifecycle marketing? I am honestly asking why, let me know if you are a non believer in the new way of powering a Digital CS motion with Customer Voice Bonus if you are going to be at #ZeroIn ChurnZero's event on October 16-17 come listen to my talk about Digital CS: Accelerate and Scale Customer Success with Customer Voice

We know how tough it can be to stay on top of your customer relationships. One minute, they're raving fans—the next, you've got an unexpected churn on your hands. 😓 What you need is to be proactive about tracking account health. Here are a few simple ways you can do that: ➡️ Use real-time health scores to spot accounts that need attention quickly ➡️ Monitor engagement signals like product usage, support tickets, and content interactions ➡️ Set customizable alerts to ping you when an account shows signs of trouble When you can see the vital signs of your customer relationships at a glance, it's much easier to step in and make a difference before it's too late. Plus, you can identify growth opportunities with your happiest accounts. Curious to learn more? Check out our latest blog post for a deep dive into the power of the HubSpot Customer Success Workspace: https://hubs.ly/Q02WZXtP0

🌟 Exciting update! Our CSM Director, Julia Ruvolo, discusses the powerful impact of data-driven client strategies in a recent Built In feature. Her team's approach is making significant strides by focusing on smarter lead generation and enhanced engagement. Discover how they're transforming real estate marketing with innovative tactics. For a deeper look at how Ylopo is leading the charge in customer success, dive into the full article here: https://lnkd.in/gkYdnYtz #RealEstateInnovation #DataEmpowerment #CustomerSuccess

Are you struggling with Customer Retention? Despite high scores and positive feedback, renewals often fall through. Do you hear, "We love your product, but can't quantify its value to renew"? 📉 The struggle is real: Many SaaS companies face such customer churn, impacting revenue forecasts and straining success teams. Our latest research at GTM Partners shows that focusing solely on customer retention is a narrow approach that often leads to high churn and low Net Revenue Retention (NRR), ultimately stalling growth and devaluing company valuations. 💡 A new approach: Consider shifting from isolated retention efforts to a holistic strategy of customer growth. This involves integrating customer success into all department objectives and creating valuable outcomes. This will significantly increase your customers’ time to value! 🌟 Why it matters: This strategy can turn customer relationships into long-term growth engines, securing revenue and aligning teams with a mission beyond retention. We’ve got data points to show the impact this new approach can have. 👉 Learn more: Read our report to implement this strategy in your organization. — 👇🏼 Subscribe to GTM Monday for weekly insights. Join 50,000+ leaders mastering their go-to-market strategies with us! #CustomerGrowth #GTMonday

📣 Here are all the top LinkedIn posts on customers success from 3/15 to 3/21. Anita Toth - why you need to aim higher than "satisfaction" - https://lnkd.in/g6yNjy_T Antti Nevalainen - how to seamlessly integrate automation while preserving the authenticity of human interaction in the customer journey - https://lnkd.in/gxTWPQdW Bob Mathers - the what, why, how of customer advisory councils - https://lnkd.in/gSibiYeu Dan Ennis - 5 takeaways from the "Scaling your CS team and your mindset" session - https://lnkd.in/gj48hY8v Daphne Costa Lopes - renewal planning prioritization quadrant - https://lnkd.in/gay7Usz9 Diana De Jesus - AI tools to save time - https://lnkd.in/gqeQCutH Elizabeth Italiano - the story of a renewal gone wrong - https://lnkd.in/g7Vdk5DB Jeff Kushmerek - how to go from cost center to profit center - https://lnkd.in/gCm_JDtK Julie Fox - why you need DCS to create exceptional customer experiences at scale - https://lnkd.in/gwTP8-mu Maranda Dziekonski (she/her) - approaching convos around price increases - https://lnkd.in/gTNmETGm Parker Chase-Corwin - the 5 pillars of digital engagement you need before moving ahead with a digital CS motion - https://lnkd.in/gzCSYVEx Sara Masson - how to sanity check if you have your customer's attention in convos - https://lnkd.in/gq2bprty Seán Reid - the three categories companies evaluate software during economic hardships - https://lnkd.in/ghap-B9M -- 🚨 Did we miss a post? Let us know in the comments to make sure others don't miss it either 👇 ❤️ Was this helpful? Make sure to follow the Matik page to continue seeing these weekly roundups! -- 🌟 What is Matik? Matik automates the personalization of content, including data-driven elements like tables, charts, and insights. Compatible with Google Slides, Microsoft PowerPoint, and emails. See it in action: https://lnkd.in/gmWedmqb #customersuccess #csm

Some great takeaways for my partner Edward Chiu. This survey reinforces everything we are hearing from customers - Customer Success is an increasing investment with a focus on the effective growth of revenue. Our sole focus at Totango + Catalyst Software is building a platform to support this critical outcome.

Has Customer Success been forgotten? It’s partly funny, partly painful… The last couple of nights I’ve dug deeply into Bowtie Analytics in an outstanding course run by Fiona Chiu. Part of the course were real life cases from scaling SaaS businesses. We would then nerd out on the data we see and try to diagnose what might be going wrong. While equal parts of the program were dedicated to acquisition as well as retention revenue dynamics, we found ourselves with the following scenario: 🚀 Diagnostics on the Sales side. Super in depth, super many questions, deep understanding of everyone. - What does pipeline generation look like? - What are the dominating channels? - How has rep productivity been developing over the last couple of quarters - How does the pipeline acceptance rate relate to industry standard - What’s the pipeline velocity, ARPA, Sales cycle length and primary ICP verticals 🤷♀️ Diagnostics on the Customer Success side. Basically: Is there anything in place at all? - Are there any processes and cadences in place to serve customer retention - Are there any structured touchpoints after the initial onboarding and before “it’s 90 days to renewal” - Does the team have any ability to work their book of business What I believe is that this remains the reality at a lot of SaaS businesses. Their acquisition process is shaped, improved and evolving every single quarter. Customer Success is struggling with budget, recognition and delivering impact on the back of that. Recurring revenue is the result of recurring impact. So we need to get better understanding retention and expansion dynamics - and invest in it. As I’m an optimist at heart. This means to me that there is so much potential to tackle and opportunity for the customers we serve. How well build out is your retention side of the Bowtie >< ? #RevenueArchitecture #GTM #Revenue 🐶 Jacco van der Kooij Marcus Bening Jeroen Hendriks Ben M. Hope Koen Stam Brendon Montgomery

𝐂𝐔𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐔𝐂𝐂𝐄𝐒𝐒 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐂-𝐋𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐋 𝐒𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐠𝐢𝐜 𝐕𝐚𝐥𝐮𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐈𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐂𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫 𝐒𝐮𝐜𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐃𝐞𝐚𝐫 𝐂-𝐋𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐥 𝐄𝐱𝐞𝐜𝐮𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞, In today’s competitive landscape, the integration of Customer Success into your strategic vision is not just beneficial; it’s imperative. Customer Success is 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐫𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐬𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐠𝐫𝐨𝐰𝐭𝐡 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐟𝐢𝐭𝐚𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲. Here are the key reasons why onboarding Customer Success into your strategy is crucial: 𝐂𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫 𝐑𝐞𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧: Customer Success ensures that your clients achieve their desired outcomes while using your product or service. It’s far more cost-effective to retain existing customers than to acquire new ones. 𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐮𝐞 𝐆𝐫𝐨𝐰𝐭𝐡: By focusing on customer success, we can identify opportunities for upselling and cross-selling. Successful customers are more likely to expand their relationship with us, leading to increased lifetime value. 𝐁𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐀𝐝𝐯𝐨𝐜𝐚𝐜𝐲: Satisfied customers become brand advocates, providing valuable referrals and testimonials. Positive word-of-mouth can significantly reduce marketing costs and increase credibility. 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐝𝐮𝐜𝐭 𝐈𝐦𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭: Customer Success teams provide direct feedback from customers, which is essential for product development. This feedback loop can lead to innovations that keep us ahead of the competition. 𝐑𝐢𝐬𝐤 𝐌𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐠𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧: Proactive customer success efforts can identify and resolve issues before they escalate. This reduces churn risk and protects your brand reputation. 𝐒𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐠𝐢𝐜 𝐀𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐧𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭: Customer Success aligns the entire organization around the customer’s jyourney and experience. It fosters a culture of customer-centricity, which is critical for long-term success. 𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐚-𝐃𝐫𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐧 𝐃𝐞𝐜𝐢𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬: Customer Success provides valuable data that can inform strategic decisions. Leveraging this data can lead to more effective targeting and resyource allocation. My conclusion, 𝐂𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫 𝐒𝐮𝐜𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐢𝐬 not just a department; it’s 𝐚 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐬𝐞𝐭 that should permeate your entire organization. By embedding Customer Success into your strategy, we can ensure that every decision we make contributes to the satisfaction and success of your customers, which in turn, drives your own success. I look forward to discussing how we can further integrate Customer Success into your strategic initiatives. Warm regards, 𝐉𝐢𝐦 𝐒𝐦𝐢𝐭𝐬 𝐀 𝐂𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫 𝐒𝐮𝐜𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐟𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 #CustomerSuccess #BusinessStrategy #BusinessValue #RevenueGrowth

This week I’m  reflecting on what happened 📅 𝙇𝙖𝙨𝙩 𝗪𝗲𝗲𝗸 𝗶𝗻 𝗖𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝗠𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 📅 at G2 We had our first virtual Executive Advisory Board Meeting of the year. I feel super lucky that I get to sit in on all of these calls, it’s basically a master class in marketing from some of the top SaaS CMO’s and marketing leaders.  While the discussion covered a few different topics, the one that I was most excited about was customer retention. We asked this group how they’re approaching it at their organizations, and I wanted to share a few tactics that came up, my takeaways and a few places where customer marketing can plug in: 📚𝗦𝗵𝗮𝗿ing 𝗖𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝗦𝘂𝗰𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗦𝘁𝗼𝗿𝗶𝗲𝘀 📚 Before I worked here I was a G2 customer, and  my question for my CSM (shoutout Lauren McGrath) was always “Can you share some examples of how other customers are doing this?” My takeaway here is I'm going to approach all customer stories with a “how did they do it” approach to make customer stories work harder for both new and existing customers. ✉️𝗖𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝗦𝗲𝗴𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 (𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘆 𝗰𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁) ✉️ Focusing on getting your customer segments right and hitting them with the information they need when they need it is a great way to impact potential churn. But I think the key here is making sure the comms you’re sending are super relevant to them and actionable. When we’re working on customer nurtures here I always keep the “show me you know me” mantra in mind. ⏰𝗟𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝗜𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗮 ⏰ This is one of my fav plays for customer marketing and I'm glad to hear other companies were thinking about this. Being able to flag when a customer is shopping for one of your competitors with intent data to predict potential churn feels like a super power. If you're interested in this, Anna Niles and I just did a webinar where we shared a few plays -- let me know and I can drop the link! But my ultimate takeaway from this conversation is a reminder that customer retention is not just one team’s job. Across the board everyone agreed that cross functional alignment and shared goals were the ultimate key to successfully impacting customer retention. Would love to know, how are you approaching customer retention in customer marketing at your org?