1327: How Customer Success Can Drive 30% YOY Growth w/ Jeff Breunsbach

WEBVTT 1 00:00:05.759 --> 00:00:09.070 Welcome back to beb growth. I'm Logan lyles with sweet fish media. I'm 2 00:00:09.070 --> 00:00:13.509 joined today by Jeff Bruns back. He is the director of customer experience at 3 00:00:13.550 --> 00:00:16.550 higher logic. Jeff, welcome to the show. Man. Thanks, Logan. 4 00:00:16.710 --> 00:00:19.429 Going to be here. Excited to spend a few minutes with you today. 5 00:00:19.829 --> 00:00:24.579 Yeah, man, I'm curious what is on your phone's home screen right 6 00:00:24.579 --> 00:00:27.379 now. I feel like that gives me a little bit of a window into 7 00:00:28.140 --> 00:00:32.100 the people we have on the show and maybe sparks some some fun. What 8 00:00:32.299 --> 00:00:34.899 is that for you right now, man, so I've got a couple. 9 00:00:34.939 --> 00:00:38.450 I've got a couple of notifications just from work email. That's on here. 10 00:00:38.850 --> 00:00:43.009 Had A couple notications from instagram, but maybe more importantly, I'll show you. 11 00:00:43.450 --> 00:00:45.250 I don't know if the viewer viewers won't be able to see that, 12 00:00:45.289 --> 00:00:49.250 but I've actually got a picture of my wife and I from our wedding day 13 00:00:49.689 --> 00:00:53.159 and what I think is the best picture of us, and so that's that's 14 00:00:53.479 --> 00:00:56.359 on the bet on my background. It's been there since we actually the day 15 00:00:56.520 --> 00:00:59.280 after we got married and we got the pictures back. Good reminder for me 16 00:00:59.399 --> 00:01:03.359 just about keeping my my wife and family kind of foremost at the center of 17 00:01:03.399 --> 00:01:04.950 my mind pretty much all the time, something big in my life. I 18 00:01:06.549 --> 00:01:07.790 love it. Man, you and I were, Jim and on family stuff 19 00:01:07.790 --> 00:01:12.870 before we hit record. For anybody who's WHO's listening to this and looking for 20 00:01:14.030 --> 00:01:19.420 content on worklife balance or, as Carlos often says, worklife boundaries, follow 21 00:01:19.540 --> 00:01:23.140 Carlos Hidalgo on Linkedin in his podcast. Anyway, that's a side note. 22 00:01:23.180 --> 00:01:27.299 We're going to be talking about proactive customer success and that might not be a 23 00:01:27.379 --> 00:01:32.019 term a lot of listeners have heard yet today, and I think this is 24 00:01:32.099 --> 00:01:36.730 going to be aplicable whether you work alongside a CS leader or you're one of 25 00:01:36.769 --> 00:01:40.769 those leaders who's maybe in a Cro roll, or your over sales and customer 26 00:01:40.810 --> 00:01:46.129 success. We're seeing a lot of changes in these typically siloed functions come together. 27 00:01:46.290 --> 00:01:49.719 But before we talk about how to do proactive customers success, Jeff, 28 00:01:49.840 --> 00:01:55.159 you and Jay have become close friends of James, myself and the sweet fish 29 00:01:55.200 --> 00:02:00.000 team through Linkedin, and I've just seen a lot of passion for customer success 30 00:02:00.000 --> 00:02:04.750 as a discipline and for the practitioners of customer success. Where did that come 31 00:02:04.790 --> 00:02:07.789 from for you and Jamn? Yeah, so Ja and I were lucky enough 32 00:02:07.909 --> 00:02:14.349 to work in businesses and customer success and software kind of tech enabled services. 33 00:02:15.150 --> 00:02:19.460 And then about three years ago there's a consulting firm that we started called customer 34 00:02:19.460 --> 00:02:23.580 imperative, and for us that was, I mean, I just told everybody 35 00:02:23.699 --> 00:02:28.500 was like an MBA be in a short span because we got to go see 36 00:02:28.500 --> 00:02:31.610 sixty different companies. We worked on sixty projects over those three years. We 37 00:02:31.689 --> 00:02:36.169 got to go see, you know, a couple hundred different we had about 38 00:02:36.210 --> 00:02:39.129 four hundred Pi discussions over those three years with customer success leaders, CEOS, 39 00:02:39.530 --> 00:02:44.210 a ton of people in SASS companies. And so for us, what I 40 00:02:44.319 --> 00:02:47.800 think really maybe the passion point came from is we all go through experiences as 41 00:02:47.840 --> 00:02:53.599 consumers and the BB space is no different and it's really connecting humans with humans. 42 00:02:53.639 --> 00:02:58.439 And so when you think about customer success and the the proactive peace and 43 00:02:58.479 --> 00:03:01.509 customer experience, it all kind of came back to we all have these experiences 44 00:03:01.550 --> 00:03:05.669 on our day to day life and so jay and I think became really passionate 45 00:03:05.710 --> 00:03:09.789 about making sure we could bring that human element and just bring that Lens into 46 00:03:09.830 --> 00:03:14.379 customer success. That says we don't really have to overcomplicate this. We just 47 00:03:14.460 --> 00:03:16.539 need to think about how are we connecting human to human? Even though it's 48 00:03:16.659 --> 00:03:21.460 kind of two corporations that might be making the the financial transaction, it still 49 00:03:21.580 --> 00:03:25.580 is a human, human connection and so fortunate for us, we actually just 50 00:03:25.659 --> 00:03:30.849 announced today while we're recording this, that customer imperative was acquired. So we 51 00:03:30.969 --> 00:03:36.210 got acquired by higher logic, which is a community and engagement platform and they've 52 00:03:36.250 --> 00:03:39.330 been really big, premier player in the Association space for a number of years 53 00:03:39.610 --> 00:03:44.400 and they're making some headway over into the the corporate space or the bbsas space, 54 00:03:44.520 --> 00:03:49.759 where we engage with a lot, and so really happy for where we're 55 00:03:49.800 --> 00:03:52.479 about to go and what we're about to do to join that team because I 56 00:03:52.520 --> 00:03:55.229 think it really there's really a good intersection for J and I around this whole 57 00:03:55.270 --> 00:04:00.750 idea of building community and then building customer engagement. That were we're excited about 58 00:04:00.750 --> 00:04:03.270 for the next step. Yeah, absolutely. For anybody who may have missed 59 00:04:03.270 --> 00:04:05.669 it, we actually did in time it this way, but we just had 60 00:04:06.189 --> 00:04:10.500 Kevin Olansky, SMO of higher logic, on just a few days ago, 61 00:04:10.539 --> 00:04:13.259 so we'll link to that in the show notes. We had a great conversation 62 00:04:13.340 --> 00:04:17.899 about category creation, the the process the team at higher logic is going through 63 00:04:18.300 --> 00:04:24.019 on that point, as well as some of Kevin's previously experience when it comes 64 00:04:24.019 --> 00:04:28.689 to category creation and category design when he was at blackboard. But for today, 65 00:04:28.769 --> 00:04:32.569 Jeff, we're talking about proactive customer success and, as you and I 66 00:04:32.649 --> 00:04:36.689 were talking a little bit offline, I feel like customer experience, customer success, 67 00:04:38.009 --> 00:04:42.639 service support, all of these terms kind of get mixed together and the 68 00:04:42.839 --> 00:04:46.160 clear definition of what each one means. It's kind of like the old debate 69 00:04:46.360 --> 00:04:50.120 is, is content marketing a subset of inbound or vice versa? Those sorts 70 00:04:50.120 --> 00:04:54.310 of things. It feels like on the customer experience front we're going through that 71 00:04:54.470 --> 00:05:00.389 same sort of figuring out process of the definition. So proactive customer success, 72 00:05:00.910 --> 00:05:05.389 how do you define that? So we like to think about that as how 73 00:05:05.870 --> 00:05:11.019 we, as a business and as the kind of the humans of the business 74 00:05:11.060 --> 00:05:14.899 are actually working with our customers, in our clients to achieve their outcomes. 75 00:05:14.980 --> 00:05:18.860 So we think about a lot of times how you do have functions in the 76 00:05:18.899 --> 00:05:23.889 organization to help support the customer you've got on boarding right. How do we 77 00:05:23.930 --> 00:05:28.529 get them onto our tool, onto our software implemented correctly? We have a 78 00:05:29.009 --> 00:05:31.089 support function that is fixing kind of broke fix you know, I can't do 79 00:05:31.209 --> 00:05:35.639 something, how do I fix it? You've got other function or maybe professional 80 00:05:35.680 --> 00:05:41.600 services, where they're offering additional services on top of the software that really are 81 00:05:42.040 --> 00:05:47.480 project driven. They're really about potentially unlocking data and analytics could be tied in 82 00:05:47.519 --> 00:05:51.230 their best practice as things like that. And now we've really started to find 83 00:05:51.269 --> 00:05:57.269 as this role of customer success which is how do we take that commercial conversation 84 00:05:57.350 --> 00:06:00.470 we were having in the sales process and that beautiful relationship that we're building, 85 00:06:00.949 --> 00:06:04.540 that strategic relationship that we're building, and how do we have a function that 86 00:06:04.740 --> 00:06:10.939 really helps to carry that strategic discussion after that initial sale and really, again, 87 00:06:10.939 --> 00:06:14.579 its focused on the outcomes of what the customers trying to achieve. So 88 00:06:15.579 --> 00:06:18.769 we like to think about that customer success manager typically is the role that this 89 00:06:18.930 --> 00:06:24.449 is really born through. And when you think about customer success manager, they're 90 00:06:24.490 --> 00:06:28.889 really trying to get into what you do Logan as a business, so that 91 00:06:28.889 --> 00:06:32.680 I can understand how you make money, how your business interacts, what you 92 00:06:32.759 --> 00:06:36.600 might be selling your you know, industry that you sell into, and if 93 00:06:36.639 --> 00:06:40.639 I can get to intimately know all of that and I can build a relationship 94 00:06:40.639 --> 00:06:44.720 with you, then inherently I should be able to align what our software is 95 00:06:44.800 --> 00:06:47.269 doing towards the outcomes that you're looking to achieve as a business. And I 96 00:06:47.389 --> 00:06:51.189 think in the old perpetual license days that was missing, because a lot of 97 00:06:51.269 --> 00:06:54.990 times it was just hey, I'm going to sell you a license and I'm 98 00:06:54.990 --> 00:06:58.829 going to offer support and then maybe we're going to upgrade that every so often. 99 00:06:58.949 --> 00:07:00.540 But really it's like you were set on your own. And now we're 100 00:07:00.579 --> 00:07:04.660 finding is since we've really pivoted the entire model to be subscription based. Now 101 00:07:04.779 --> 00:07:09.100 we have an incentive as a business. I have an incentive to make sure 102 00:07:09.139 --> 00:07:13.180 you logan are you know, we're newing you every single year, because now 103 00:07:13.339 --> 00:07:17.329 my lifetime value for you has lengthened. It hasn't gone from one tenzero transaction. 104 00:07:17.490 --> 00:07:21.050 Now it's gone from now I have, you know, ten or Onezero 105 00:07:21.689 --> 00:07:26.529 dollars worth of ten transactions and I need to ensure that. And so there 106 00:07:26.689 --> 00:07:30.519 that's why customer success has really come in to exist to make sure we're having 107 00:07:30.519 --> 00:07:34.680 the strategic conversations that were aligning our product towards the right outcomes and goals of 108 00:07:34.800 --> 00:07:39.800 what the customer is trying to achieve and ultimately, that the customer feels like 109 00:07:39.839 --> 00:07:43.439 they actually have a relationship with us outside of just, you know, contacting 110 00:07:43.480 --> 00:07:46.509 a support number or, you know, sending off a one off email, 111 00:07:46.550 --> 00:07:49.750 like we've got actually something substantial that we can rely upon. Yeah, absolutely. 112 00:07:50.149 --> 00:07:53.430 There are a couple of things, as I was just taken notes their 113 00:07:53.430 --> 00:07:57.430 jeff that I think or are worth calling out, and that is the focus 114 00:07:57.629 --> 00:08:01.899 on the customer outcomes and I think that if I sum up customer success in 115 00:08:03.100 --> 00:08:09.019 any way, the customer outcomes and enabling the the successful customer outcomes, that 116 00:08:09.220 --> 00:08:11.500 has to be part of the definition. I don't know if I have a 117 00:08:11.579 --> 00:08:16.649 one sentence definition for customer success or proactive customer success, but I know that 118 00:08:16.730 --> 00:08:20.290 that's part of it. You know, you think about Joey Coleman's book never 119 00:08:20.370 --> 00:08:24.329 lose a customer again, and I heard him talking on the customer experience podcast 120 00:08:24.370 --> 00:08:28.040 with Ethan Butte, and it was either there or maybe it was a different 121 00:08:28.079 --> 00:08:31.320 conversation, but that that episode was great. He talked about the I think 122 00:08:31.320 --> 00:08:35.840 it's the nine phases. He almost he almost skipped one and that was like 123 00:08:37.120 --> 00:08:41.590 delivering on the results that the customer wanted and it was like man, that's 124 00:08:41.629 --> 00:08:43.789 really eye opening, because we just kind of take that for granted. The 125 00:08:43.950 --> 00:08:48.789 other thing I really like about what you said in adopting this proactive customer success 126 00:08:48.870 --> 00:08:56.100 mindset is taking what sales looks at. This is a commercial relationship. We 127 00:08:56.220 --> 00:08:58.460 are trying to find a win win, where you get value, we get 128 00:08:58.500 --> 00:09:03.059 value and customer success. Taking that same mindset, not we're just keeping the 129 00:09:03.179 --> 00:09:07.700 customer happy, we're enabling them to be able to use our product and that's 130 00:09:07.740 --> 00:09:11.970 not the goal any longer. It is. It is really a focus on 131 00:09:11.129 --> 00:09:15.809 how do we make sure that they are getting maximum value, and that is 132 00:09:15.889 --> 00:09:18.330 actually going to not only drive attention, but it's going to drive, as 133 00:09:18.370 --> 00:09:22.169 you alluded to, add ons, up cells, cross cells, those sorts 134 00:09:22.169 --> 00:09:24.879 of things. What are some of the results you've seen from customers who have 135 00:09:26.120 --> 00:09:31.039 made this shift into adopting a proactive CS mindset? I think the the biggest 136 00:09:31.080 --> 00:09:35.039 thing or the biggest outcome as a business if we're able to make this shift, 137 00:09:35.120 --> 00:09:41.070 is we now have net revenue attention in the positive. So if you 138 00:09:41.110 --> 00:09:43.149 think about net revenue attention, what we're talking about there is, you know, 139 00:09:43.149 --> 00:09:46.590 let's let's kind of look at what our base are are was for that 140 00:09:46.710 --> 00:09:50.029 time period that we're looking. We're going to subtract any down cells, we're 141 00:09:50.029 --> 00:09:54.620 going to subtract any potential churns that happen, but then we get the ability 142 00:09:54.620 --> 00:09:56.820 to add on upsell, Cross cell, any sort of expansion revenue that we 143 00:09:56.860 --> 00:10:03.220 have. So the best businesses in BBS as right now are achieving that net 144 00:10:03.299 --> 00:10:07.490 revenue attention of of a hundred percent and even above, typically one hundred ten 145 00:10:07.529 --> 00:10:09.570 to one fifteen percent. And what that really means is you actually have, 146 00:10:11.169 --> 00:10:15.370 you know, fifteen to twenty thirty percent of growth in the current customers you 147 00:10:15.490 --> 00:10:18.850 have. That's you could go you know, you could essentially say we're never 148 00:10:18.889 --> 00:10:20.639 going to go sell another dollar from our sales team, and yet we're still 149 00:10:20.639 --> 00:10:24.720 growing thirty percent year over year as a business. And that's where you see 150 00:10:24.720 --> 00:10:31.000 the the big impact is if you can get customers success right for a BBSASS 151 00:10:31.039 --> 00:10:35.029 company, then you have this net revenue retention which is just huge when you 152 00:10:35.110 --> 00:10:39.990 think about your growth trajectory, when you think about valuation as a business as 153 00:10:39.029 --> 00:10:41.990 well a lot of companies. You know that our bb Sass right now or 154 00:10:41.990 --> 00:10:46.070 venture capital back potentially private equity backed, and so the valuation becomes key. 155 00:10:46.190 --> 00:10:50.179 But I think one of the things that I really liked about what you just 156 00:10:50.340 --> 00:10:56.019 mentioned is this whole idea of sales is doing such great work. I mean, 157 00:10:56.139 --> 00:10:58.299 sales is so hard to go land a new sale right. It is 158 00:10:58.779 --> 00:11:03.539 grueling work. It is hard to go build those relationships, to really get 159 00:11:03.700 --> 00:11:05.450 value right, like to drive in, like the whole idea of like, 160 00:11:05.490 --> 00:11:07.929 Hey, we're going to sell you something for and you're going to get something 161 00:11:07.929 --> 00:11:11.610 in return of value like that is so hard, and so I think one 162 00:11:11.649 --> 00:11:13.529 of the things that we're trying to do in terms of customer success is help 163 00:11:13.570 --> 00:11:18.529 evangelize like yes, sales is still hard, and then we don't want that 164 00:11:18.600 --> 00:11:20.559 to drop, like we don't want all that hard work just to kind of 165 00:11:20.600 --> 00:11:24.360 go down into the trough of despair, so to speak. And so customers 166 00:11:24.360 --> 00:11:28.279 success should really be the champion that's picking up that relationship. And you know, 167 00:11:28.480 --> 00:11:31.159 there are tons of different way is to go execute this in terms of 168 00:11:31.200 --> 00:11:35.909 who has the commercial responsibility after that initial sale. But the whole idea of 169 00:11:37.750 --> 00:11:41.309 hey, we have that relationship and we can actually figure out who the right 170 00:11:41.389 --> 00:11:45.629 one is to bring in for the commercial discussion. That can solely that can 171 00:11:45.669 --> 00:11:48.779 be figured out, but not, you know, if we drop the relationship 172 00:11:48.820 --> 00:11:52.019 after that initial sale, that's really hard to get back and to get somebody 173 00:11:52.019 --> 00:11:54.980 back to that level. And the second thing I'm just going to really harp 174 00:11:54.100 --> 00:11:58.460 on it there too, is sales is is doing all the hard work for 175 00:11:58.659 --> 00:12:01.409 customer success and on boarding teams, and then the big thing that we can 176 00:12:01.490 --> 00:12:07.090 do as kind of on boarding implementation and customer success teams is how can we 177 00:12:07.409 --> 00:12:09.769 how can we really get that information out of sales in the right way that 178 00:12:09.889 --> 00:12:13.690 makes it easy for sales to implement and input and then makes it easy for 179 00:12:13.769 --> 00:12:18.000 us to really capture the information and take it and use it to our advantage. 180 00:12:18.159 --> 00:12:20.120 When we think about the questions you're asking in sales, you know about 181 00:12:20.159 --> 00:12:24.159 what their goals are, what their outcomes are, who their key stakeholders are, 182 00:12:24.559 --> 00:12:28.279 what they do as a business. All of these things can be repurposed 183 00:12:28.440 --> 00:12:31.950 in our organization. So finding easy ways to make sure that that transition is 184 00:12:31.070 --> 00:12:35.309 happening is the number number one thing that we always see going into organizations that 185 00:12:35.389 --> 00:12:39.029 can be improved and that, if you get it working right, it's going 186 00:12:39.070 --> 00:12:43.029 to be really impact man. Thank you so much for just acknowledging how hard 187 00:12:43.110 --> 00:12:46.460 sales works and how hard sales is at times. I've heard people say, 188 00:12:46.539 --> 00:12:50.659 you know, marketing is getting harder, sales is getting easier. I don't 189 00:12:50.700 --> 00:12:54.220 know if I necessarily agree with that. I think in every area it's kind 190 00:12:54.220 --> 00:12:56.299 of like as a parent, right, you talk, you you're like, 191 00:12:56.379 --> 00:13:00.009 I've got a nine and a ten year old. Well, I've got a 192 00:13:00.129 --> 00:13:03.769 fifteen and a sixteen year old, which is harder. They're just different. 193 00:13:03.850 --> 00:13:05.769 They're harder in different ways, and I think that the same holds true for 194 00:13:05.850 --> 00:13:11.610 sales marketing and see us so anyway as a twelve year experience quota carrying salesperson. 195 00:13:11.850 --> 00:13:16.399 I appreciate that. I know you wanted to touch on two ways that 196 00:13:16.559 --> 00:13:22.480 leaders can really enable or or act on this idea of proactive customer success, 197 00:13:22.720 --> 00:13:28.590 number one being not skipping the fundamentals of CS and the other is a facilitating 198 00:13:28.669 --> 00:13:31.990 great relationships with the other functions in the business. I'd actually like to skip 199 00:13:33.029 --> 00:13:35.230 to that second one real quick because you already alluded to one. How do 200 00:13:35.269 --> 00:13:39.269 you create a great working relationship with sales from CS? You know, to 201 00:13:39.350 --> 00:13:43.940 give you some insight, we're a small team of twenty plus here at Sweetish, 202 00:13:43.179 --> 00:13:46.100 but one of the things I've been really thankful for as a sales team 203 00:13:46.139 --> 00:13:50.779 of one is we use chorus. If you're not familiar with chorus, course 204 00:13:50.899 --> 00:13:54.620 that AI check them out for your call recording software. It has been a 205 00:13:54.700 --> 00:13:58.929 game changer for me to take my strategy and late stage sales calls and be 206 00:13:58.009 --> 00:14:03.929 able to turn over those full recordings to our CS team, which is our 207 00:14:03.970 --> 00:14:07.769 team of producers here at Sweet Fish, and they have full insight into those. 208 00:14:07.809 --> 00:14:11.000 They can search the transcripts of them, they can I don't have to 209 00:14:11.120 --> 00:14:13.279 kind of relay this is what I think the customer set, this is what 210 00:14:13.440 --> 00:14:18.200 they told me right, and you lose a lot of that in translation sometimes. 211 00:14:18.279 --> 00:14:22.279 So not having sales via black box and going to sales and saying what 212 00:14:22.480 --> 00:14:26.789 information can we make it easy for you to share with us as this CES 213 00:14:26.909 --> 00:14:31.070 team, I think is something that other teams can enact and, especially on 214 00:14:31.149 --> 00:14:35.309 bigger teams, is probably going to have an even bigger multiplayer effect, whether 215 00:14:35.389 --> 00:14:39.740 it's sales or marketing or finance. What are some of the other key relationships 216 00:14:39.779 --> 00:14:43.139 you see from the CS side and some of the ways that people can facilitate 217 00:14:43.299 --> 00:14:48.179 those as they get into the weeds. Yeah, definitely so, and certainly 218 00:14:48.259 --> 00:14:52.460 love. I'll give a chaut out to to I mean one of the best 219 00:14:52.460 --> 00:14:56.289 things you can do as a customer success leader is just look inward at the 220 00:14:56.330 --> 00:14:58.610 tools your teams are already using and figure out how you might be a leverage 221 00:14:58.610 --> 00:15:03.169 it. I mean just example you gave right, like chorus ai is has, 222 00:15:03.370 --> 00:15:05.929 you know, their main use case has been around sales team and helping 223 00:15:05.970 --> 00:15:07.159 them get a more efficient. Think about how you can use that as a 224 00:15:07.279 --> 00:15:11.519 CS team as well. Right, we can listen in and recordings, we 225 00:15:11.600 --> 00:15:13.159 can help train, we can help look at, you know, who's a 226 00:15:13.320 --> 00:15:18.039 great performing CSM versus who maybe you need some opportunity. So loved, love 227 00:15:18.120 --> 00:15:22.710 that idea. So there's maybe four relationships I'll highlight here and just one one 228 00:15:22.789 --> 00:15:24.950 kind of quick sentence about each one and the way that I think about them. 229 00:15:26.029 --> 00:15:28.429 So finance, I think, is a huge relationship if you're a customer 230 00:15:28.470 --> 00:15:33.990 success leader. Customer success leaders have have a hard time just fighting for budget. 231 00:15:33.110 --> 00:15:35.500 You know, I think it's easier in the this is where I think 232 00:15:35.500 --> 00:15:39.100 it's a little bit easier in the sales and marketing side. Because they have 233 00:15:39.659 --> 00:15:43.419 matured as functions in the organization so much that they have, you know, 234 00:15:43.500 --> 00:15:46.539 you've got formulas and calculations that you can really rely upon as you're, you 235 00:15:46.580 --> 00:15:50.409 know, an executive in a marketing, your sales role, and so customer 236 00:15:50.450 --> 00:15:52.730 success needs a little bit of that definition. So I think one of the 237 00:15:52.850 --> 00:15:56.769 things you can do with finances go build a financial model alongside of your finance 238 00:15:56.850 --> 00:16:00.970 team that they feel comfortable about and that you feel you can defend. And 239 00:16:00.330 --> 00:16:04.679 the reason why that becomes important is then you have a way to go fight 240 00:16:04.799 --> 00:16:11.559 for resources, whether that's human capital or technology or other teams resources or time. 241 00:16:11.080 --> 00:16:14.919 But unless you have that financial model, it's always going to be really 242 00:16:14.919 --> 00:16:18.149 challenging for you to walk into your executive teams meetings and say I need an 243 00:16:18.190 --> 00:16:22.669 extra CSM, because they're always going to push back on well, what's telling 244 00:16:22.669 --> 00:16:25.389 you need that and you can't just say Oh, it's a feeling I have 245 00:16:25.629 --> 00:16:29.110 or they're overloaded right. You need some of that definition in order to help 246 00:16:29.149 --> 00:16:33.860 that. Is that financial model, Jeff, usually based around tracking that net 247 00:16:33.980 --> 00:16:37.220 revenue retention. Is that kind of the crux of it, and then you 248 00:16:37.340 --> 00:16:41.500 kind of build out what Kpis are going to show you what are the leading 249 00:16:41.500 --> 00:16:44.860 indicators that you're hiding in the right direction? Yeah, definitely, Yep. 250 00:16:44.940 --> 00:16:47.570 So I think some of the standard ones are, you know, looking at 251 00:16:47.570 --> 00:16:51.809 renewals that are upcoming in the quarters ahead, looking at your gross retention, 252 00:16:52.049 --> 00:16:56.490 which is essentially just taking into account from what we have today, how much 253 00:16:56.529 --> 00:17:00.570 are we actually retaining in terms of both revenue and logo retention, and then 254 00:17:00.610 --> 00:17:03.079 net revenue attention is also built into that as well. So see, those 255 00:17:03.079 --> 00:17:07.359 are, you know, standard metrics. But to your point, even then, 256 00:17:07.400 --> 00:17:08.759 just breaking down some of the PNL to look at, you know, 257 00:17:08.960 --> 00:17:12.440 what's my capital resources on my team? How are we looking at that? 258 00:17:12.559 --> 00:17:15.069 And so just really getting tied with finance to come up with what that model 259 00:17:15.109 --> 00:17:18.670 looks like. So I think that's the first one. The second one, 260 00:17:18.670 --> 00:17:21.869 I think, is product. This is a challenging one, but I think 261 00:17:22.470 --> 00:17:26.910 you have to find a good way to tell the story of what your customers 262 00:17:26.950 --> 00:17:32.500 are talking about to product. So how are we compiling customer feedback that can 263 00:17:32.579 --> 00:17:37.619 create tangible and actionable ideas for the product team? So maybe what you don't 264 00:17:37.660 --> 00:17:41.019 do is just send off every time a customers upset to product and just forward 265 00:17:41.059 --> 00:17:45.329 it off to somebody and it just goes into a black hole and then there's 266 00:17:45.329 --> 00:17:48.329 a you know, there's a discord there, no like. How do we, 267 00:17:48.490 --> 00:17:49.529 you know, how do we look at all the channels? We're getting 268 00:17:49.529 --> 00:17:53.609 NPS feedback, we're getting cease at surveys, we're having one on one conversations 269 00:17:53.849 --> 00:17:59.119 that we record via chorus Ai. How do we compile all of that into 270 00:17:59.680 --> 00:18:03.720 actionable ways that we can then go tell the story across the organization and specifically 271 00:18:03.799 --> 00:18:07.119 go work with our counterparts and finance, to say, or in product, 272 00:18:07.200 --> 00:18:08.799 excuse me to say, you know, are these things on our roadmap? 273 00:18:08.839 --> 00:18:11.960 Are They not? Are they going to be valuable to our customer? Are 274 00:18:11.000 --> 00:18:15.029 They not? And hopefully what product is coming with is also their perspective. 275 00:18:15.069 --> 00:18:19.029 Maybe they're meeting with customers as well in and that creates a really good dialog 276 00:18:19.069 --> 00:18:22.549 there. So I think product is a second one. Third is the sales 277 00:18:22.750 --> 00:18:26.029 so I mentioned it earlier. Another one to think about for sales is how 278 00:18:26.109 --> 00:18:32.740 do you help them continue to refine the ideal client profile? So you again, 279 00:18:32.859 --> 00:18:36.940 as the customer success leader, have such a great advantage in the sense 280 00:18:36.980 --> 00:18:40.740 that we have customers today. We have all of these customers. It can 281 00:18:40.819 --> 00:18:42.369 be ten, it can be a thousand, but one of the best things 282 00:18:42.410 --> 00:18:47.609 you can do is go into that customer base and look for who are our 283 00:18:47.730 --> 00:18:52.369 best customers, who renew on time, who are overperforming in terms of their 284 00:18:52.490 --> 00:18:56.240 goals and outcomes. And then again, how do I package that up in 285 00:18:56.319 --> 00:19:00.319 a good story and in a good framework that I can take to sales and 286 00:19:00.359 --> 00:19:03.839 start having that discussion? Hey, you know, our ideal client profile looks 287 00:19:03.880 --> 00:19:06.680 like X, Y and Z today, but I'm noticing, you know, 288 00:19:06.759 --> 00:19:08.759 a, B and c looks really good from our customer side. Have we 289 00:19:08.799 --> 00:19:11.750 thought about you know, are we going after the right targets? How are 290 00:19:11.789 --> 00:19:15.109 we really meshing those things together? So if you can go help sales do 291 00:19:15.230 --> 00:19:18.269 that huge right you can bring that feedback. It's a big advantage. I 292 00:19:18.430 --> 00:19:22.630 love that and I think the common and ality there between what you said about 293 00:19:22.750 --> 00:19:29.500 sales taking the information you have to help them refine their ICP and taking information 294 00:19:29.579 --> 00:19:34.059 back to product on how you can continue to improve and enhance the the product 295 00:19:34.579 --> 00:19:38.730 is not just bringing problems to them, but how do you bring ideas and 296 00:19:38.890 --> 00:19:45.049 solutions and opportunities? Saying like, hold on a sec we've had three customers 297 00:19:45.089 --> 00:19:48.809 in the in the last month that are asking for this feature. I think 298 00:19:48.809 --> 00:19:51.529 I heard that that was on the road mount. There might be a case 299 00:19:51.650 --> 00:19:56.319 for escalating that. Here's three clips of customers getting really passionate about this from 300 00:19:56.319 --> 00:20:00.160 our course recordings right or going to sales saying, it seems like folks that 301 00:20:00.200 --> 00:20:04.880 are in this industry, if you're not a completely vertical, vertical market solution, 302 00:20:06.400 --> 00:20:08.789 then hey, sales, you really have an opportunity here to go after 303 00:20:08.950 --> 00:20:14.710 the legal market or assass companies or hr what whatever. That is in your 304 00:20:14.750 --> 00:20:18.710 kind of pointing them in the direction. But again the commonality is you're framing 305 00:20:18.750 --> 00:20:23.660 it and you're bringing them opportunities, not problem. So I love that and 306 00:20:23.740 --> 00:20:27.819 I see the commonality in the product and the sales relationship. From the CS 307 00:20:27.900 --> 00:20:32.619 side. What's number four on the list of key relationships, Jeff, number 308 00:20:32.660 --> 00:20:37.289 four as marketing, our marketing counterparts. So again, one of the best 309 00:20:37.289 --> 00:20:41.609 advantages you have of being in customer success. We have the customers today. 310 00:20:41.849 --> 00:20:45.970 So how can we proactively bring case studies in examples into marketing? How can 311 00:20:47.009 --> 00:20:51.799 we identify again who's really out overperforming and outperforming what we want to do and 312 00:20:51.880 --> 00:20:56.240 accomplish? In terms of outcomes. Who is who are advocates in terms of 313 00:20:56.240 --> 00:21:00.519 NPS surveys or C Stat? Who's just championing our name? Who is active 314 00:21:00.559 --> 00:21:03.319 on Linkedin, like who is you? Who Do we notice that's active on 315 00:21:03.359 --> 00:21:06.670 linkedin that can become a really big advocate of ours? And and then how 316 00:21:06.670 --> 00:21:10.190 do you work with marketing to package those up? How do we think about 317 00:21:10.349 --> 00:21:14.109 mediums and how do we think about then actually delivering that back into the customer 318 00:21:14.190 --> 00:21:15.829 base, because I think that is something that maybe is a little bits miss 319 00:21:15.869 --> 00:21:18.220 thought of. Is, yes, we want to go use that and leverage 320 00:21:18.220 --> 00:21:21.779 it for our new business, but then how do we package that up in 321 00:21:21.819 --> 00:21:25.299 a slightly different way for our current customers? So, you know, we 322 00:21:25.339 --> 00:21:27.819 might have two versions of the same case study. One we send to new 323 00:21:27.900 --> 00:21:32.890 customers and you know, potentially whoever is coming into our sales funnel, and 324 00:21:32.970 --> 00:21:36.690 the others we send our current customers and it helps explain to them what are 325 00:21:36.690 --> 00:21:40.609 the processes, what are the tools, the other technologies that this business that's 326 00:21:40.609 --> 00:21:44.289 done really well that they've surrounded it with, and and I think that's that's 327 00:21:44.329 --> 00:21:48.279 often overlooked. So finance, product, sales marketing. Just one quick hit 328 00:21:48.319 --> 00:21:51.000 on each one, but I think those are really key relationships you can build 329 00:21:51.000 --> 00:21:56.880 as a customer success leader and really actionable stuff that that CS leaders can can 330 00:21:56.039 --> 00:22:00.759 do to enhance that relationship. I love how you just kind of skipped over. 331 00:22:00.079 --> 00:22:03.990 Yeah, you should have great relationships with these other functions. We've heard 332 00:22:03.990 --> 00:22:07.630 that a million ways to Sunday, but gave some really actionable stuff there. 333 00:22:07.829 --> 00:22:10.309 Well, we've got a few minutes left here, Jeff. Let's talk a 334 00:22:10.430 --> 00:22:12.230 little bit. If you have, you know, your top two or three 335 00:22:12.230 --> 00:22:15.900 things we mentioned. The other area you wanted to hit on was where you 336 00:22:17.019 --> 00:22:22.299 see companies skip the fundamentals of CS. If you've got kind of your your 337 00:22:22.420 --> 00:22:26.940 top two to four hit list of things where people are skipping and they should 338 00:22:26.940 --> 00:22:30.609 stop skipping those, what would those be as we round out the conversation today? 339 00:22:32.210 --> 00:22:34.410 Yeah, perfect. I think the first thing that comes to mind is 340 00:22:34.490 --> 00:22:40.049 just segmentation. I don't think again from the the companies that we've seen over 341 00:22:40.049 --> 00:22:42.930 the last three years, I think it's really hard to go too deep on 342 00:22:44.049 --> 00:22:48.200 segmenting your customers and then thinking about cohorts or micro segments and just finding different 343 00:22:48.240 --> 00:22:53.799 characteristics that you can group your customers by that you can create an engagement model 344 00:22:53.839 --> 00:22:59.109 around the the traditional one is you have kind of tier one, tier two, 345 00:22:59.190 --> 00:23:02.190 tier three, tier four and then you apply some sort of ratio of 346 00:23:02.230 --> 00:23:06.230 customer success managers and that's by and large what people do. I would say, 347 00:23:06.430 --> 00:23:08.109 you know, to challenge that a little bit is how do you get 348 00:23:08.109 --> 00:23:11.859 into your tier three customers or tier two customers and then segment those even further 349 00:23:12.299 --> 00:23:17.980 to help again just create a little bit more feeling of a personal relationship? 350 00:23:18.099 --> 00:23:21.380 How do we get into some of these micro segments or cohorts that you can 351 00:23:21.420 --> 00:23:23.099 act upon a little bit more easy it comes a little bit more flexible. 352 00:23:23.900 --> 00:23:27.490 So I think segmentation is probably one to really think about. The second is 353 00:23:27.569 --> 00:23:32.690 customer journey work. I think broadly everyone thinks that is a very big and 354 00:23:32.809 --> 00:23:36.170 challenging effort and yes, it can be if you're in a big organization, 355 00:23:36.210 --> 00:23:38.730 and yes, you need cross functional buy in and you need so much to 356 00:23:38.849 --> 00:23:42.480 do to go get that customer journey. But think about think about it from 357 00:23:42.480 --> 00:23:47.160 a different perspective, which is if you're a customer success later you're talking to 358 00:23:47.200 --> 00:23:49.400 your customers all the time. How can you just take the experiences that you're 359 00:23:49.440 --> 00:23:53.519 hearing from your customer and then start to just outline them on a journey yourself. 360 00:23:55.240 --> 00:23:56.710 Then how can you get a couple of people in your department to maybe 361 00:23:56.710 --> 00:24:00.509 validate or invalidate some of those things, and then how can you quickly take 362 00:24:00.589 --> 00:24:03.309 that to sales to see how they interact with that? Take it to product, 363 00:24:03.309 --> 00:24:07.069 see how they interact with that? So you don't need to necessarily make 364 00:24:07.109 --> 00:24:10.140 it a big, you know, twenty thirty person meeting. That's eight hours 365 00:24:10.180 --> 00:24:12.539 a day. But how can you just slowly start to bring those customer stories 366 00:24:12.579 --> 00:24:15.140 to life through a customer journey? And what I think that's really going to 367 00:24:15.180 --> 00:24:19.420 do for you to start to see where some breakdowns and in transitions or communication, 368 00:24:21.059 --> 00:24:23.220 what's something that we think is happening now that's not happening that we need 369 00:24:23.259 --> 00:24:26.490 it to? I'm really big. I'm trying to find what systems and tools 370 00:24:26.529 --> 00:24:30.890 are our customers engaging with at every point throughout the the customer journey, because 371 00:24:30.930 --> 00:24:33.410 you start to see some crazy things as you do that, and so I 372 00:24:33.490 --> 00:24:37.490 think just again trying to build that slowly can be something that's really beneficial. 373 00:24:38.240 --> 00:24:42.559 And the third thing is just account health. I think again, when you 374 00:24:42.640 --> 00:24:47.079 get into mature organizations. There's so much you can do with account health. 375 00:24:47.079 --> 00:24:49.680 You can get it into tools and systems, it can be automated, there 376 00:24:51.039 --> 00:24:52.750 is so much, so many data points that you can bring into it, 377 00:24:52.789 --> 00:24:56.589 and I think sometimes that gets a little overwhelming for people. So I think 378 00:24:56.869 --> 00:24:59.630 we always like to take a step back and to your point earlier, what 379 00:24:59.670 --> 00:25:03.470 I love you mentioned is this word leading indicators to net revenue attention. And 380 00:25:03.109 --> 00:25:07.619 so how can we start to identify what are some leading indicators that we know 381 00:25:07.940 --> 00:25:12.859 will positively impact our net revenue attention, and can we start to document those 382 00:25:12.900 --> 00:25:15.859 things? And even if it's in an excel sheet, even if it's yes 383 00:25:15.900 --> 00:25:19.619 or no questions right now and it's not automated, how can we just start 384 00:25:19.619 --> 00:25:22.730 to do that activity? Because I think what you're going to find is you 385 00:25:22.849 --> 00:25:26.769 can start to identify some trends of people who are falling off of the proverbial 386 00:25:26.890 --> 00:25:30.329 curve, will say, and you can hopefully pick them back up very quickly. 387 00:25:30.769 --> 00:25:34.410 Without that type you're just really relying on CSM's moving from an account to 388 00:25:34.490 --> 00:25:40.319 account and there's not really a methodical way free to do that. So segmentation. 389 00:25:40.559 --> 00:25:44.039 How can you get deep it, get micro segments customer journey. Start 390 00:25:44.079 --> 00:25:47.480 to bring the customer stories to life so that you can outline those in a 391 00:25:47.599 --> 00:25:51.109 very good way that to bring across the organization and then account health. How 392 00:25:51.150 --> 00:25:53.869 can you make it simple actionable for your team as they go forward? And 393 00:25:55.309 --> 00:25:56.990 those are three things. I think we see that if you just do them 394 00:25:57.029 --> 00:26:00.230 right, even just a little bit, then it's going to start to make 395 00:26:00.309 --> 00:26:02.630 the make a difference and then you can, you know, you can always 396 00:26:02.630 --> 00:26:06.539 build upon them in the future. Yeah, as Dan, our director of 397 00:26:06.579 --> 00:26:08.859 audience growth, was posting on Linkedin the other day, what's kind of the 398 00:26:08.900 --> 00:26:15.180 the minimum viable threshold that you could do consistently that's going to drive results? 399 00:26:15.220 --> 00:26:18.500 Maybe you can't do a hundred pushups, but maybe you could do ten right 400 00:26:18.569 --> 00:26:21.529 and and I see a correlation here. Well, we have Jeff. I 401 00:26:21.769 --> 00:26:25.609 for regular listeners of this show, they're going to know that I regularly repeat 402 00:26:25.609 --> 00:26:29.089 that this has been a great conversation, but I really do mean it today 403 00:26:29.289 --> 00:26:32.730 and this has been fantastic for any of our guests who might be listening to 404 00:26:32.809 --> 00:26:36.079 this who were on recently. I'm sorry, but Jeff just brought the fire 405 00:26:36.400 --> 00:26:41.680 and this has been a fantastic conversation we talked about the definition of proactive customer 406 00:26:41.759 --> 00:26:45.200 success, why it's important, what it can drive, which is really higher 407 00:26:45.400 --> 00:26:48.829 net revenue retention, and you did a good job of defining that. That's 408 00:26:49.190 --> 00:26:56.390 subtractions of downgrades, churns, lost accounts and additions, not of new sales 409 00:26:56.549 --> 00:27:00.269 but of expansions up cells, cross cells and those sorts of things. And 410 00:27:00.349 --> 00:27:03.019 when you can get that right you can drive fifteen to thirty percent. You're 411 00:27:03.059 --> 00:27:07.819 over your growth aside from what sales is doing, and that is just that 412 00:27:07.019 --> 00:27:11.339 is incredible to think about. And then you know the two key things. 413 00:27:11.339 --> 00:27:15.730 You talked about relationships with finance, product sales and marketing, and gave an 414 00:27:15.769 --> 00:27:18.009 action point on each one of those. And then again, the three things 415 00:27:18.049 --> 00:27:22.490 that you don't want to skip if you if you're kind of overwhelmed right now 416 00:27:22.490 --> 00:27:25.690 and you don't know where to start, to try to be more proactive in 417 00:27:25.769 --> 00:27:30.839 your cus approach. Don't skip segmenting, don't forget, don't skip some sort 418 00:27:30.839 --> 00:27:34.480 of customer segmentation beyond just kind of tier one, tier two, tier three, 419 00:27:34.920 --> 00:27:40.519 and start to gather, start to build some sort of simple dashboard on 420 00:27:40.759 --> 00:27:45.670 account health or at least identifying what are those leading indicators of account health, 421 00:27:45.950 --> 00:27:49.309 because even just that work will be eye opening. Jeff, if anybody listening 422 00:27:49.349 --> 00:27:52.309 to this would like to stay connected with you or ping you with any follow 423 00:27:52.309 --> 00:27:56.390 up questions, what's the best way for them to do that? Yeah, 424 00:27:56.549 --> 00:28:00.539 best way right now is on Linkedin. Jeff Bruns back, you'll see my 425 00:28:00.619 --> 00:28:04.539 profile there. And next place or other place to look as we've got a 426 00:28:04.619 --> 00:28:08.980 community that we built for customers success leaders. So head over to gain row, 427 00:28:10.180 --> 00:28:14.930 retaincom, sign up, open and free community. A tons of customer 428 00:28:14.970 --> 00:28:18.569 success leaders in there. We've got over thousands of people now geared towards your 429 00:28:18.170 --> 00:28:23.009 managers, directors, VPS, chief customer officers and really having a good time 430 00:28:23.170 --> 00:28:27.519 with people in engaging over there. So excited to engage wherever people come and 431 00:28:27.599 --> 00:28:32.440 find us, but linkedin and Ganger or retaincom or the places to go all 432 00:28:32.519 --> 00:28:34.279 of it. Jeff. Thank you so much, man. I've enjoyed every 433 00:28:34.359 --> 00:28:37.960 conversation I've had with you, offline and online. Glad we were able to 434 00:28:38.119 --> 00:28:41.789 record it today. Really appreciate you being on the show. Absolutely looking forward 435 00:28:41.789 --> 00:28:51.869 to the next time. Hey, everybody, Logan with sweetfish here. If 436 00:28:51.910 --> 00:28:55.819 you're a regular listener of BB growth you know that I'm one of the cohosts 437 00:28:55.859 --> 00:28:57.779 of this show, but you may not know that I also head up the 438 00:28:57.859 --> 00:29:02.380 sales team here at sweetfish. So, for those of you in sales or 439 00:29:02.460 --> 00:29:04.940 sales offs, I wanted to take a second to share something that's made us 440 00:29:06.019 --> 00:29:10.569 insanely more efficient lately. Our team has been using lead Iq for the past 441 00:29:10.609 --> 00:29:15.289 few months and what used to take us four hours gathering contact data now takes 442 00:29:15.329 --> 00:29:18.410 us only one. We're seventy five percent more efficient. We're able to move 443 00:29:18.609 --> 00:29:25.519 faster withoutbound prospecting and organizing our campaigns is so much easier than before. I'd 444 00:29:25.559 --> 00:29:29.279 highly suggest you guys check out lead Iq as well. You can check them 445 00:29:29.319 --> 00:29:37.319 out at lead iqcom. That's Elle a d iqcom. It's sweetfish. We're 446 00:29:37.359 --> 00:29:41.069 on a mission to create the most helpful content on the Internet for every job, 447 00:29:41.190 --> 00:29:45.230 function and industry on the planet, for the BB marketing industry, this 448 00:29:45.390 --> 00:29:49.230 show is how we're executing on that mission. If you know a marketing leader 449 00:29:49.309 --> 00:29:53.059 that would be an awesome guest for this podcast. Shoot me a text message. 450 00:29:53.220 --> 00:29:56.460 Don't call me because I don't answer unknown numbers, but text me at 451 00:29:56.579 --> 00:30:00.420 four hundred seven for and I know three and thirty two eight. Just shoot 452 00:30:00.420 --> 00:30:03.619 me their name, maybe a link to their linkedin profile, and I'd love 453 00:30:03.779 --> 00:30:07.289 to check them out to see if we can get them on the show. 454 00:30:07.849 --> 00:30:07.329 Thanks a lot