CS-X.io

📢Women of Customer Success London: Join us for Sips & Tips Networking Event 🙌 Join our chapter leads Meg McKinlay-Lloyd &  Lucy Wilkinson this September for an evening of networking and sharing as we come together to share our favorite tips for Customer Success and share our stories! The event is sponsored by founder Jamie Robson of CS-X.io, the ultimate CS platform for start-ups! Admission is free but ticketed due to a 50 person limit at the venue so please do sign up below before they book up! 👇 REGISTER HERE: https://lnkd.in/eUU9junZ Your Ticket Includes:  ✨ Welcome Drink ✨ Goodie Bag ✨ A Fun evening of networking and sharing When and where:  📅  Tuesday 3rd September 2024 📍 Devonshire Terrace, Devonshire Square, London EC2M 4WY #CustomerSuccess #WomenOfCustomerSuccess #Networking #London #WomenInBusiness #womenintech #techlondon #Leadership

I stopped dealing with support tickets and increased customer NPS by 120% in 12 months. This might sound crazy, but there is method in the madness! Let me explain. In one of the early start-ups I worked in, I quickly realised we were far too reactive. We were always putting out fires, responding to issues as they came up, and scrambling to keep customers happy. It felt like we were always one step behind, and customers noticed. One day, after yet another call with a frustrated customer, I decided we needed a new approach. We needed to shift from reactive support to proactive engagement. This wasn’t just about reducing our stress levels; it was about delivering real value and building lasting relationships with our customers. We needed to change the narrative, stop re-inforcing all the "bad" things and start focusing on the good. Here’s how we made the transition: 🤝 We started by really getting to know our customers. I had in-depth conversations with customers to understand their goals, challenges, and what success looked like for them. This gave us a clearer picture of how we could help them succeed, not just react to their problems. 📋 We developed mutual success plans for each customer, outlining their desired outcomes, key milestones, and how our product could help them achieve their goals. These plans were created collaboratively, ensuring that both our team and the customer were aligned and accountable. 📅 Instead of waiting for issues to arise, we scheduled regular check-ins to review progress, gather feedback, and address any potential concerns before they became problems. This helped us build trust and show our customers that we were invested in their success. 📈 We used product data to monitor customer usage patterns and identify early warning signs of potential issues. This allowed us to step in before small problems escalated, showing our commitment to providing exceptional support. 🏆 Finally, we made it a point to celebrate our customers' successes. When they achieved their goals, we acknowledged their accomplishments and highlighted how our partnership contributed to their success. This reinforced the value we provided and strengthened our relationships. The results were huge. Customers felt more supported, our team was less stressed, and we saw a significant improvement in retention rates. There were still technical issues and we kept on top of tickets, but we stopped treating them as the most important thing - moving away from reactive support to proactive engagement not only improved our customer relationships but also positioned us as partners in their success. If you’re feeling stuck in a reactive support cycle ask yourself this, is this really the most effective use of my CSMs time? Take a step back and consider how you can shift towards a more proactive approach. Have you made this transition? I’d love to hear your stories and tips! #CustomerSuccess #Startup #SaaS #CSP

I was recently asked, "If you could implement one process as the first CS hire in a business, what would it be?" For me, it's a no-brainer: a customer value framework. 1. 🤝 Define Ideal Customer: Collaborate with other departments to identify our ideal customer and determine how we help them. Develop example "desired outcomes" for these customers. 2. 🗺 Map Product Features: Align product features with the core value proposition. Identify which areas of the product help customers achieve their outcomes, guiding adoption efforts. 3. ✅ Capture Desired Outcomes: Implement a process to capture customers' desired outcomes starting in the sales process and ensure they are carried through the entire journey. 4. 📋 Create a Success Plan Template: Develop a template that includes desired outcomes, success criteria, timelines, and deliverables. This should be a mutual plan created with the customer to hold both parties accountable. 5. 👨💼 Build Success Plan Reviews: Integrate success plan reviews and outcome tracking into our workflow. Regularly ask, "Are we still delivering your desired outcomes?" and adjust the plan as needed. 6. 🎯 Set Core KPIs: Make the achievement of desired outcomes a core KPI. We can add additional layers later to further support customer success. Focus on the fundamentals and what drives value for your customers. Is there anything you'd add or do differently? #customersuccess #saas #csp

I built a customer success platform from scratch—no co-founder, no team, no funding, no capital, and no experience—all while working 40+ hours a week. I realised that existing CS platforms were too complex, too expensive, and focused on "looking busy" (pointless dashboards, endless automation, playbooks on top of playbooks). All the start-ups I've worked with needed a platform long before they implemented one. Put off by the cost, complexity, and management requirements, it was seen as a "nice to have." That's why I decided to build something specifically for start-ups. During a break between jobs, after some rapid research, I jumped right in. I found a development tool to quickly spin up an MVP. Despite a steep learning curve, I figured it out as I went. For the first few months, I worked 12-14 hours a day, every day. It was inefficient, and I threw several versions in the bin and started over. Many hours were frustratingly wasted, but at least I was learning from my mistakes. I found my stride about four weeks in. When I started a new job, I'd work all day, have dinner, walk the dog, and then work until midnight. I spent almost every weekend working on it, and worked through summer and over Christmas. After a few thousand hours and no more than £500 spent (subscription costs for the platform I was using), I finally "launched." I was hoping for a flood of messages asking for demos but quickly realised I needed to learn how to take a product to market. That brings me to now. I’m still learning the marketing side of things, but I believe I've built a tool that helps start-ups deliver customer success and addresses real issues around price and complexity. CS-X.io delivers a better customer experience and can turn around new features faster than any other platform on the market. My mission is to help you go from "start-up" to "scale-up" by accelerating your customer success efforts and giving you the right tools for the job. I don't know if all the hours I've invested will be worth it in the end, but all that matters is I’m trying something, learning something, and believing in something. If you have any tips for me or other people who are doing the same thing, let me know in the comments! P.S - A special thanks to my incredibly patient, supportive and encouraging partner Hollie Ellis, I really couldn't have got this far without cheering me on! #customersuccess #csplatform #saas #startup #csp