A couple of years ago we started talking in terms of “customer success” instead of “sales engineering” as we used to before. This almost seamless transformation started to form when we noticed that customer loyalty could no longer be gained or attributed to just having a successful sales engagement, or making the annual follow up call to our customers, reminding them it is time to renew their maintenance & support contract. Yes, we kept good track of customer details and communications in Salesforce, but the CRM was really only good for managing data, not so much for relations and retention management.

After creating our subscription-based licensing model, it started to become clear that our current practices were no longer enough. We had to find better ways, ongoing ways, to communicate with our customers, ensure their satisfaction, guarantee their retention and reduce churn.
The new subscription business model demanded that we invest in enhancing our services to our customers. In addition to the normal ongoing support services, we also had to be able to offer them onboarding, training and adoption support services, and in order to do that we had to create a relationship management platform, one that could help us help them reach the ROI we promised from our product, so they will see the benefit in continuing to pay their licenses.

Naturally, we always valued customer satisfaction and believed in long-term partnerships, but now it became an essential practice if we wanted to ensure business continuity and growth.

This article is sort of ‘lessons learned’, in which I summarize our journey so far, what we’ve learned about achieving, measuring and evaluating customer success, and some things we should consider doing next.

Customer Success – what is it about:

Customer success is a proactive approach aimed at creating enduring relationships with our customers, by helping them ensure they achieve their desired outcomes. It involves walking with- and guiding customers throughout their journey, offering ongoing support, training, and other services, thus enabling them to derive maximum value from our product. By aligning our own objectives with the customer goals, we can build strong partnerships which eventually result in mutually beneficial outcomes.

Essential Strategies for Customer Success:

To achieve customer success, we must start prioritizing our customer’s satisfaction and success. These strategies include:

a) Onboarding and Adoption: A smooth onboarding process coupled with comprehensive training programs ensures our customers can quickly realize the value of their investment. This involves personalized demonstrations, guided tutorials, and access to support resources. We do not skip or spare on that step – it is one of the most essentials!

b) Proactive Communication: we create an open and personal channel of communication with the customer (dedicated customer success engineers), and perform regular check-ins, feedback sessions, and immediate addressing of any concerns raised.

c) Customization/Scalability: each customer has unique requirements, and we have to tailor our services to better meet their unique needs. When our product scales according to our customer’s need, it creates long-term commitment and customer loyalty.

d) Ongoing Value Delivery: when we frequently release new features, updates, and improvements, it demonstrates our commitment to the customer’s success. When we offer value-added services, such as training or webinars, it maximizes the customers’ utilization of our product and ensures our long-term relationship.

Measuring and Evaluating – Customer Success Metrics:

By finding ways to measure customer success we will be able to gauge the effectiveness of our service and identify areas of improvement. Several metrics have been developed in the industry to evaluate and determine performance:

a) Net Promoter Score (NPS): NPS quantifies customer loyalty by measuring their likelihood to recommend the product or service to others. Higher scores indicate satisfied customers who are more likely to become advocates for our technology.

b) Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT): CSAT surveys assess customer satisfaction levels based on individual interactions. Regularly collecting CSAT data highlights potential pain points and areas where improvements can be made.

c) Customer Churn Rate: This metric measures the rate at which customers discontinue or cancel their license. Analyzing churn rate over time helps identify underlying issues and provide insights for rectification.

d) Time-to-Value: Tracking the time it takes for customers to realize value from the product or service reveals the efficiency of onboarding and adoption processes. Shorter time-to-value signifies successful customer onboarding.

e) Customer Lifetime Value (CLV): CLV estimates the total revenue a customer is expected to generate over their entire relationship with us. Evaluating CLV aids in determining the impact of customer success strategies on business growth.

Final note:
Customer success is a journey, not a one-instance magic. We must adopt a proactive approach that focuses and ensures our customers’ long-term success, and creates mutually beneficial, strong relationships. By implementing essential activities, such as comprehensive onboarding and proactive communication, we will increase customer satisfaction and loyalty, and therefore our business. Measuring and evaluating some of the customer success metrics I mentioned above, will provide us with valuable insights into the effectiveness of our initiatives. Prioritizing customer success will lead us towards increased customer retention, positive word-of-mouth, and – as a result of these – sustainable business growth.