When was the last time the CSM for a product you use reached out to you for any of the following reasons: 1) to inquire about a role on your website that you're hiring for, and ask if they could maybe send any candidates your way 2) to congratulate you / your team on top notch usage or milestones of the product 3) for a heads up that they sent you a small gift in the mail through Sendoso just cuz... 4) to recognize you / your company around positive news / PR / award recently won 5) to reference a recent post you made on linkedin + share their thoughts on it 6) with a suggestion or recommendation to another vendor you might consider using, based on the needs you have expressed within your business Perhaps the really really good CSMs have engaged in this sort of interaction with you recently. But I'm assuming you are not on the recieiving end of it very often. Any CSM can send an email at 90 / 180 days to do a check-in / QBR, and share some sort of usage report. and YES, that's a critical part of the role. But if you really want to establish better relationships with clients, set aside the CSM checklist now and then, and engage human to human. Friends, this is a huge unlock for CSMs - leading to stronger relationships, generating better responsiveness from clients, increasing ability to multi thread, and positioning your service to be "taken with" if your POC leaves for another company. If my CSM interacts with me in some of the ways above, I view them as a partner (not a vendor) and thus... -when they wanna do a QBR, I inherently agree -when they reach out, I respectfully reply post haste -when they ask for a referral, I strongly consider it -when they inquire about agreed upon implementation / adoption milestones, I'm accountable. PS - this type of work does NOT have to require lots of time. If you're smart with alerts / zaps / time blocking, you can gather the info you need on your book of accounts with ease, and then spend the meat of your time in thoughtful, personal engagement.
In defense of a lot of CSM's they have 100's of accounts a, onerous requests from multiple business units in the organization that sever themselves NOT the customer.
Engaging with clients on a personal level is vital to building strong relationships. Checklists and KPIs on outreach rates and touchpoint tallies are counterintuitive to relationship building. Also, not all customers are the same. You need to be able to interact with your customers how they want, which may not be on your checklist for {whatever date}.
or asked how your kids are doing by name
Good old human connection! Love it. Go Sendoso btw!
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6moHad a conversation with a client a while back and there "tech stack" looked a bit like this: Salesforce ZoomInfo Demandbase Outreach Highspot Clari Bombora G2 Got me really thinking about her world and how it relates to the "martech, sales, adtech" incentives of "usage, adoption, product ROI etc" Dawned on me all of us say we are " customer centric, consultative" but it's typically through the lens our respective product. Brent Adamson mentioned this a few months back: Rather than thinking “customer centric,” think "supplier agnostic.” A CSM ( vendor) solely focused on the adoption/usage of their product in isolation is akin to looking at a painting through a toilet paper tube. :) Here is the counter intuitive thing that happens when you genuinely become supplier agnostic: Retention and renewal rates go up truly understanding their world enables us to provide a robust set of recommendations, ideas and marketplace insight to help the customer been successful. customer success manager NOT product success Love the notion of " customer centric" but a lot of organizations are customer centric through the lens of their product = absolutely NOT customer centric at all. Replace " customer centric " with supplier agnostic.