ON TODAY’S EPISODE:How many customers should a CSM manage? And how do I determine this? This is a common but complex question which is why in this week’s episode of Impact Weekly Johan and Lincoln cover the importance of understanding the elements involved in capacity planning and creating a plan that takes into consideration the appropriate experience for customers across all lifecycle stages. They offer insights and strategies to help organizations effectively plan and allocate resources to provide the best customer experience possible.THIS WEEK’S QUESTION:“What is the method to calculate how many accounts a CSM should manage?”TOPICS BEING ADDRESSED:* Aspects to consider when doing capacity planning* Common misconceptions and problems about capacity planning* The importance of Lifecycle Capacity planningQUOTES:Lincoln Murphy (01:19):“I think we need to be careful that we're not just working with accounts.”Lincoln Murphy (04:40):“What we wanna do is get to a point where we can have some predictability”Lincoln Murphy (07:12):“And so even where we're planning, we're still gonna lag behind because we're not taking into consideration all of the growth from sales.”Johan Nilsson (07:43):“Customer success needs to take charge and make the plan"Lincoln Murphy (10:51):“If your CFO is coming to you with numbers that were pulled from some benchmark report, you as head of customer success, need to advocate for yourself and your team and push back on those numbers.”Lincoln Murphy (12:58):“Segmenting customers based on what you pay, is really just a continuation of that old school account management way of thinking.”Lincoln Murphy (15:43):“We really need to understand what our customer's appropriate experiences is and group our customers together like that.”Johan Nilsson (19:12):“Some things we do too high level, and this is one of the things you need to spend some time on”Do you want more of this? Check out Impact Academy for interactive Customer Success training programs. https://www.impactdemy.com/Do you have a question you want us to answer? Submit it here.

ON TODAY’S EPISODE:Do you want to solve the mystery of customer ghosting and win back your customers attention? Tune in to this week's episode of Impact Weekly! Johan and Lincoln break down the reasons why customers may stop engaging and give actionable tips on how to re-engage and keep them engaged.THIS WEEK’S QUESTION:What do you do when a customer is ghosting you?TOPICS BEING ADDRESSED:* Examining root cause of customers ghosting us* Aligning customer messaging with their goals and priorities* Strategies to re-engage the customerQUOTES:Johan Nilsson (01:13):"Don't let it become emotional"Johan Nilsson (05:15):"Turn the table here and ask yourself: "Am I ghosting someone in my life right now?"Lincoln Murphy (08:29):"It's not like somebody is sitting there intentionally thinking about ways to ignore you!"Lincoln Murphy (09:03):"We're not always evil and nefarious in our intentions."Lincoln Murphy (09:32):"We're overestimating our own importance."Lincoln Murphy (11:35):"They're not ignoring you. They just don't care."Lincoln Murphy (12:46):"Think about what's in it for them"Johan Nilsson (13:18):"You need to make sure you are talking about the right goal for the right customer"Lincoln Murphy (15:56):"Taken a few minutes with the team to kind of brainstorm on what could possibly happen"Johan Nilsson (18:25):"Instead of trying to achieve everything at once [...] we need to break it down in steps to open the door again."Do you want more of this? Check out Impact Academy for interactive Customer Success training programs. https://www.impactdemy.com/Do you have a question you want us to answer? Submit it here.

ON TODAY’S EPISODE:In this week's episode of Impact Weekly, Johan and Lincoln delve into the often-daunting task of communicating pricing changes to customers. Whether it's upper management's decision or a necessary shift in your business model, it's crucial to approach the topic with a plan to minimize any potential negative impact on customer satisfaction. Tune in for expert tips and strategies on how to effectively communicate these changes and keep both your customers and team happy.THIS WEEK’S QUESTION:“If upper and senior management has increased prices across the board for all products and services, what’s the best course of action for the Customer Success Manager and team to reduce the blow?”TOPICS BEING ADDRESSED:* Managing Pricing Changes* Communicating with Customers Effectively* Minimizing Negative Impact of Pricing ChangesQUOTES:Lincoln Murphy (02:03): “if you have a high price, there's just automatically a positioning of this being a premium product”Lincoln Murphy (05:55): “The main thing to focus on here, which is short-term thinking versus long-term strategic “Johan Nilsson (07:12): “You need to have a clear logic behind this price increase.”Lincoln Murphy (08:57): “We really need to get away from this idea of difficult conversations.”Lincoln Murphy (09:00): “We really need to get away from this idea that CSMs shouldn't be commercial.”Lincoln Murphy (10:33): “Knowing that this is something that your customers are gonna expect will automatically soften that blow.”Johan Nilsson (12:15): “Empathy in this case is really key.”Lincoln Murphy (16:20): “You want to tell them as soon as possible because that will help soften the blow.”Lincoln Murphy (17:32): “Give your CSMs as much of a heads up on this and as much lead time as possible.”Do you want more of this? Check out Impact Academy for interactive Customer Success training programs. https://www.impactdemy.com/Do you have a question you want us to answer? Submit it here.

The podcast discusses the trend of customer success moving towards specialization across the customer lifecycle, emphasizing the importance of a team approach to customer ownership. It explores the benefits of adding specialists in customer success roles and highlights the need for clear communication and collaboration between teams. The chapter also addresses effective communication, good leadership, and building a team approach to customer success.

ON TODAY'S EPISODE:As a Customer Success Manager, expansion is part of your responsibilities, but what do you do if you feel pressure to drive expansion but lack the confidence to know where to start? Tune in to this week's episode of Impact Weekly, where Johan and Lincoln will help you navigate this common challenge. They'll explain how to achieve the right mindset and position yourself as a strategic advisor, as well as provide tips on using orchestration and social proof to prepare your customers for expansion. Don't let the pressure get you down – tune in and learn how to overcome your doubts and drive successful expansion.THIS WEEKS QUESTION:“I'm getting more and more pressure to upgrade and expand on my customers, but I'm not feeling confident in doing that. What should I do?”TOPICS BEING ADDRESSED:*Achieving the right mindset and objective confidence*Positioning yourself as a strategic advisor*Using orchestration and social proof QUOTES:Johan Nilsson (00:39): ”I think we can interpret pressure here both as pressure coming from a boss or manager but also where you have your own pressure to do more, and maybe you feel that you should be doing more expansion but you're just not sure on how to do that.”Lincoln Murphy (03:50): “My first discussion with anybody that wants to expand is, do you have additional things to sell?”Lincoln Murphy (04:49):”As customers become more successful with us, there's going to be logical opportunities for them to expand their relationship with us.”Lincoln Murphy (06:06): ”When you try to employ the same tactics that you would on totally new people, you can actually end up hurting the relationship that we have with the existing customer because we're treating them like we don't have that relationship.”Lincoln Murphy (08:36): “Nobody is under any delusion that this isn't a commercial relationship. It's right there in your title, Customer Success.”Lincoln Murphy (11:49): “You have to understand that expansion is part of success.”Lincoln Murphy (15:43): “This whole idea of expansion shouldn't just be on the CSM to figure out for their customers. This needs to be approached in a more strategic way.”Johan Nilsson (16:05): “A lot of companies are still missing a lot of opportunities when it comes to setting up their pricing and plans for expansion focused growth.”Do you want more of this? Check out Impact Academy for interactive Customer Success training programs. https://www.impactdemy.com/Do you have a question you want us to answer? Submit it here.

ON TODAY'S EPISODE:Are you frustrated by the lack of preparation some customers seem to have during the onboarding process? Do you wonder if it's a problem with the sales team, or if there's something else going on? Find out by joining Johan and Lincoln on this week's episode of Impact Weekly, where they'll discuss this common issue and provide strategies for overcoming it. THIS WEEKS QUESTION:“A lot of my customers are not prepared when starting onboarding. I feel like sales is cutting corners. Should sales have done more before handing the customer over? And what can I do to overcome this?”TOPICS BEING ADDRESSED:* Common challenges in the onboarding process* Causes for unprepared customers* Measures to take to avoid unprepared customersQUOTES:Johan Nilsson (02:09):”There's a lot of things being covered in the sales process they will not go through everything that you might want to know, in the onboarding phase.”Lincoln Murphy (07:02): “It's not evil salespeople. It's usually the customer either misunderstanding or just not hearing.”Johan Nilsson (08:40):”So we also need to check ourselves as customer success managers that we cannot expect to have everything served to us when we start onboarding.”Lincoln Murphy (11:28): “CSMs are doing everything with their customers across all lifecycle stages. [...] And this is where you really need to look at capacity planning.”Lincoln Murphy (13:21): “There's three things that customers hate and that’s surprises, unknowns and repeating themselves.”Lincoln Murphy (15:30): “Just open a Google doc and start writing down everything that a customer has to do on their own, outside of the product, on their own inside of the product and things that you will do with them and things that you will do for them.”Lincoln Murphy (21:31):”If you help the salesperson close a deal, you're now their best friend”Lincoln Murphy (25:18): “Don't let perfection get in the way of actually making progress.”Do you want more of this? Check out Impact Academy for interactive Customer Success training programs. https://www.impactdemy.com/Do you have a question you want us to answer? Submit it here.

ON TODAY'S EPISODE:Are you tired of losing customers during the onboarding process? Do you feel like your efforts are going to waste as you watch them disengage and potentially downgrade? It's time to turn things around and take control of the onboarding experience. This week on Impact Weekly, Johan and Lincoln will be breaking down the key factors that contribute to an effective onboarding process. They'll be sharing the most common mistakes businesses make and how to avoid them, so you can keep your customers engaged and invested in your product.THIS WEEKS QUESTION:“My customers seem really excited when they come in to onboarding, but they kind of lose interest and we lose momentum in the onboarding. How can I keep my customers engaged during onboarding?”TOPICS BEING ADDRESSED:*Effective onboarding for success*Maximizing adoption and engagement*Managing customer expectations.QUOTES:Lincoln Murphy (01:00): “Onboarding is probably the most structured life cycle stage”Lincoln Murphy (02:14): “I call onboarding the functional valley of sadness.”Johan Nilsson (07:09): “What experienced customer success managers or onboarding specialists do is that they put a lot of sense of urgency in the beginning to get things moving:”Lincoln Murphy (12:16): “Onboarding is not about technical engineering or the functional aspects of it. It's really about social engineering.”Lincoln Murphy (16:49): “There's three things that customers hate, surprises, unknowns, and repeating themselves.”Do you want more of this? Check out Impact Academy for interactive Customer Success training programs. https://www.impactdemy.com/Do you have a question you want us to answer? Submit it here.

The discussion revolves around the effectiveness of Quarterly Business Reviews (QBRs) in customer success. Misconceptions are challenged, revealing that QBRs can sometimes hinder rather than help customer satisfaction. The hosts emphasize the importance of quality over quantity in customer interactions, critiquing appointment quotas. They explore various meeting types and stress the need for tailored engagements based on customer needs. Practical tips for maximizing meeting effectiveness and preparation are also shared, aiming to enhance value for clients.

ON TODAY'S EPISODE:We have all been in the unpleasant situation of trying to win back a customer that is about to churn, but how much time should you spend doing that? What should we consider before trying to save a customer and are there important differences here? In this week’s episode of Impact Weekly, Johan and Lincoln cover the many aspects of customer win-backs and how to make sure you leverage your time, energy and focus.THIS WEEKS QUESTION:“How much time should you spend trying to win back a customer? When is it over?”TOPICS BEING ADDRESSED:* Success potential is a game changer* Low vs. high percentage activities* What high impact interventions meanQUOTES:Lincoln Murphy (02:04): “If you're trying to scale your organization as a head of customer success or as a csm [...], you're gonna wanna focus on high percentage activities.”Johan Nilsson (07:32): “Sometimes a customer will inform you that they are thinking of canceling. And I think that's also a quite important distinction to make if they haven't canceled, but they're informing you or they're looking at alternatives or thinking of canceling. That's something to pick up on as well.”Lincoln Murphy (10:18): “I'm not gonna try to save those customers that don't have success potential. The reality is if you spend any time with them and you are able to save them, you're just prolonging the inevitable because they're, they're going to churn out.”Lincoln Murphy (11:08): “We need to be transparent about how we got to this point. We know how we got to this point. They know how we got to this point. And if we choose to ignore that, then that could hurt trust.”Lincoln Murphy (13:18): ”Customers that don't have success potential generally don't stay that long, because they're not gonna be able to get the value that they need from this relationship.”Johan Nilsson (14:44): “It's also important for a customer success manager to be able to say, I'm done here. I'll have to move on to the next one.”Lincoln Murphy (18:56): “If you make them give you an exit interview before you know we can finalize the cancellation, what you are doing is guaranteeing that you're gonna get really bad intel.”Do you want more of this? Check out Impact Academy for interactive Customer Success training programs. https://www.impactdemy.com/Do you have a question you want us to answer? Submit it here.

ON TODAY'S EPISODE:Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) is a buzzword that is thrown around a lot but what does it actually mean for Customer Success and can it do more harm than good? What is the missing component to ICP that really changes everything? In this episode of Impact Weekly, Lincoln and Johan discuss Ideal Customer Profile in depth and how Customer Success can adopt and evolve ICP to help alignment, onboarding and growth for the whole company.THIS WEEKS QUESTION:“We talk a lot about Ideal Customer Profile internally but Sales keep bringing in anything but ICPs, what can I do?”TOPICS BEING ADDRESSED:* What is Ideal Customer Profile and what are some common misconceptions* Getting alignment between Sales and Customer Success* Success potential, bad fit customers and communicationQUOTES:Johan Nilsson (03:07): “ICP can be something high level that marketing put together more for positioning the brand and it’s not really connected to your actual customer and business.”Lincoln Murphy (06:07): “As a sanity check on any new customer that comes in we should be running a success potential checklist against them to know whether or not they have the potential to be successful.”Johan Nilsson (07:30): “Even if a customer fits all the criteria for the success potential, that’s no guarantee for success. That’s just setting the grounds that this is a customer that can be successful and here is where our work starts in CS to help them unlock this potential.”Johan Nilsson (10:15): “Don’t overdo it, don’t make it too complicated, start with something basic you can really use.”Lincoln Murphy (10:43): “[Ideal Customer Profile] is living and breathing something that is going to evolve over time. Don’t let perfection get in the way of progress”Lincoln Murphy (13:35): “If they need a lot of help and we can’t provide that then that means that that customer right now doesn’t have success potential.”Do you want more of this? Check out Impact Academy for interactive Customer Success training programs. https://www.impactdemy.com/Do you have a question you want us to answer? Submit it here.