We live in an age where the importance of customer success and its vital role within an organization is becoming muddied.
Maybe we’re losing focus – as CS is responsible for increasingly more and more tasks. With 42% in charge of 10 or more as of this year, we thought it was time to take a step back and see what real CSMs think about CS – why it’s important for them and how it enables their and their teams’ success.
Here’s what we uncovered:
1. CS Empowers Our Product Development and Market Fit
As a young startup aiming to disrupt the market and find its footing in the early stages, Customer Success is pivotal. It empowers the company to advance product development while engaging closely with early adopters from your target audience. This early engagement guides your long term product positioning, messaging on value, GTM strategy to help you build a solid product for TAM.
2. CS Drives Our Profitability and Cost Efficiency
I’ll share a few stats because data is the best story.
Drive Profitability
Orgs with CS have on average 14% higher GRR.
Costs 3-6X more to acquire a new customer versus retain an existing customer (eg. For every existing customer you lose, you need 3-6 to replace that revenue)
Growth
Industry average success rate of selling an existing customer is ~50% versus 5-20% for new customer
Boost brand reputation through more and better customer reviews and improve sales motions through reliable customer references
Product Improvement
Unless Product has excellent vision, has excellent customer data, and regularly reaches out to customers, it’s most likely CS that can inform what works, what are the gaps, where can the product go next.
For my company (B2B SaaS) – CS is important for managing post sales customer lifecycle i.e.:
-Customer Onboarding
-Product Adoption
-Value Realization
-Risk Mitigation
-Renewal (Retention and churn prevention)
-Upsell (CSQL and opportunity identification)
For me, it’s the heart of customer centricity and a central team that brings customer at the forefront of the company and connects other divisions i.e. Sales, Product, Marketing with the customer lens. It’s also some of the most amazing (and empathetic) bunch of people I’ve worked with.
Madhur Choudhary – CS Leader | Coach | Director of CS, Trackunit
4. CS Helps Us Understand and Meet Customer Needs
Customer Success is about developing and delivering on solutions for partners. It is iterative work where we are learning from what happens and considering how to improve for the next time. Success work is rooted in understanding what our customers truly need, even as those needs change, and making sure the game plan evolves with them. This ongoing effort keeps us in tune with our customers and makes sure we’re always ready to support them, ensuring they are supported and realize value
Customers mean business, customers’ success means business success:
With every click, view, and purchase, your customers are telling you what they want, how they shop, and what could make them come back for more. But are you listening closely enough?
There are 2 approaches to it, one is for onboarding and one for retention.
For onboarding focus on the funnel analysis; why they choose certain items we can clearly identify which segment of our offering is most loved by our customers and excel on this
For retention after behavioral segmentation we can dig deeper on what each of the segments focus on and how they interact with your platform product or service, how we can improve the customer experience and brand loyalty.
Customer Success represents the continuous pursuit of delivering maximum value from our solutions to our customers, which in turn, helps them to accomplish their own business objectives. The responsibility is multi-dimensional, dynamic, and never-ending. Too often we think of customer success as a function, but in actuality, it is a holistic motion, delivered by many contributors, that is realized as an overall experience. How your customers experience your solution and your teams will ultimately dictate whether or not they continue to be a customer. If there is not enough value, the customer will churn, and the economics have proven to us that to lose an existing customer and replace it with a new customer is an extremely costly endeavor. Therefore, the importance of Customer Success can’t be understated. If you want to grow your business, you have to make sure you are helping your customers grow theirs.
7. CS Is Fundamental to Our Business Strategy and Growth
At Custify, we see Customer Success as the secret sauce that makes everything taste better. It’s not just about solving problems or answering questions; it’s about really getting to know what drives each customer. For instance, when we help a client streamline their workflow, it’s not just about the tech. It’s about freeing up their time so they can focus on growing their business. This personal investment in their goals builds a partnership that goes beyond the usual customer-service provider relationship. It’s these connections that transform our service into a genuine business accelerator for both us and our clients.
8. CS Strengthens Our Partnerships and Flexibility
Customer Success is the heartbeat of our journey with every client. It’s like being the crew in their ship; we’re not just there for smooth sailing but especially through the storms. 2023 taught us the power of flexibility and truly understanding our clients’ changing worlds. Whether it’s adapting our strategies or shifting our focus, every step we take is about walking alongside our clients, making sure they’re getting real value from our product. To me, Customer Success is about being genuine partners to our clients, celebrating their wins as our own, and tackling challenges head-on together. It’s this commitment to their success that makes every day meaningful and drives us to keep pushing the boundaries of what we can achieve together.
9. CS Acts as a Revenue and Growth Catalyst for Us
Ours is a complex product with quite a lot of integrations and customizations to be done to bring in all the data and get things going.
Will our customers be able to reach their goals without a dedicated success manager? – yes they may if they have necessary tools, resources and tech savviness.
But having a dedicated success manager for them will help them reach their goals (and more) in the most effective way possible.
Without taking help from the CSM I have seen most customers drop off mid way through implementation and eventually churn vs those that engage with the CSMs. This puts our org in a bad position.
For us, customer success is a revenue and growth engine.
Want to add your voice to the chorus of leading CSMs? If you work in customer success, let us know why you think CS is important, and maybe we can update this with your insights.
Until then, remember to check back in with the Custify blog for our continued coverage of your burning CS questions – from trending topics to extensive guides.
Victor Antiu is the Marketing Manager at Custify. With nearly 10 years experience, his focus is product marketing and B2B inbound strategy. When he’s not trying to fix websites and automate processes, he’s traveling and sailing around the world.
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