

CHURN FM
Andrew Michael
CHURN FM is the podcast for subscription economy pros. Every Wednesday we hear how the world’s fastest growing companies are tackling churn and using retention & engagement to fuel their growth.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Aug 4, 2021 • 47min
EP 125 | Alfie Marsh - How Spendesk built a sales and revenue model that eliminates churn
Today on the show we have Alfie Marsh, Head of US GTM at Spendesk.In this episode, we talked about Alfie’s responsibilities as Head of US GTM, the differences between the go-to-market strategies launching in the US vs the UK, and the different ways their sales team contributes to retention.We also discussed the positive impact on churn by knowing exactly who your ideal customer profile is when sourcing outbound leads, identifying and reaching out to outbound prospects and how product positioning has the power to transform your company.As usual, I'm excited to hear what you think of this episode, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear from you. You can email me directly on Andrew@churn.fm. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter.Churn FM is sponsored by Vitally, the all-in-one Customer Success Platform.

Jul 28, 2021 • 40min
EP 124 | Srikrishnan Ganesa (Rocketlane) - How revisiting your target market can help accelerate growth.
Today on the show we have Srikrishnan Ganesa, co-founder and CEO of Rocketlane.In this episode, Shri shares his experience navigating through a couple of acquisitions and how trust is the main component that ensures a smooth integration between the companies, Shri also shared what Konotor (his first startup) did prior to being acquired by FreshWorks and what their growth looked like leading to the acquisition. We then discussed how Freshchat changed their target customer by taking a step back and taking a look at the overall market, how that decision accelerated its growth, which then inspired Shri to take the leap once again and build a new product, Rocketlane.As usual, I'm excited to hear what you think of this episode, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear from you. You can email me directly on Andrew@churn.fm. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter.Churn FM is sponsored by Vitally, the all-in-one Customer Success Platform.

Jul 21, 2021 • 36min
EP 123 | Paul Lynch (Chargify) - The only silver bullet to mitigate churn is value
Today on the show we have Paul Lynch, CEO at Chargify. In this episode with Paul, as a venture partner at Scaleworks we talked about their focus on investing in companies and operating them to drive growth, how they decide which companies to invest in and the enormous impact churn and retention has on making their investment decisions. We also discussed how Chargify sets targets and the metrics they need to focus on, why a data analyst should be one of your first hires, or not, and lastly... is there such a thing as acceptable churn.As usual, I'm excited to hear what you think of this episode, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear from you. You can email me directly on Andrew@churn.fm. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter.Churn FM is sponsored by Vitally, the all-in-one Customer Success Platform.

Jul 14, 2021 • 40min
EP 122 | A major milestone for Churn FM and an exciting investment announcement - Special guest: Panos Papadopoulos (Marathon VC)
Today on the show we have an extremely exciting announcement to make and I am joined by a special guest, Panos Papadopoulos, partner at Marathon Venture Capital.In this episode, we talked about what Panos misses the most about being an entrepreneur having made his move into venture capital.We also discussed why every VP or C Level of a company should spend time on support and dove into why communication and alignment within a team is critical when it comes to combating churn and increasing retention. We then discussed why Panos and team have decided to invest in a new startup I’m launching called Avrio. I’m extremely excited to share the news with you first on Churn FM as for those that don’t know, I started the show to build an audience before building a product, and after 2 years and 120+ episodes later, today is the day we’re launching. If you’re eager to find out what we’re building you can jump straight to the announcement at 25:00 minutes in.As always, and more so today I'm excited to hear what you think of this episode, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear from you. You can email me directly on Andrew@churn.fm. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter.Churn FM is sponsored by Vitally, the all-in-one Customer Success Platform.

Jul 7, 2021 • 39min
EP 121 | Wayne McCulloch (Google Cloud) - How to build a churn crushing Customer Success team, like Salesforce and Google Cloud.
Today on the show we have Wayne McCulloch, Global Head of Customer Success at Google Cloud (SaaS).In this episode, we talked about the evolution of Customer Success at Salesforce, the greatest challenge Customer Success reps face and Wayne then shared his biggest learning moving into the Customer Success industry.We also discussed the importance of data when it comes to customer success at Salesforce, and dove into how to build a CS framework to reach a Salesforce or Google Cloud level of sophistication.As usual, I'm excited to hear what you think of this episode, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear from you. You can email me directly on Andrew@churn.fm. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter.Churn FM is sponsored by Vitally, the all-in-one Customer Success Platform.

Jun 30, 2021 • 40min
EP 120 | Etie Hertz (Loris.ai) - How customer support conversations with your customers can help reduce churn.
Today on the show we have Etie Hertz, co-founder and CEO of Loris.ai.In this episode, we talked about why Etie decided to double down on support and build Loris.ai, how it works, and how their customers use it to reduce churn. We then dove into Etie’s experience building his previous company Payment Revolution. How they prevented churn at the very beginning and how they made sure to stay top of mind. Etie then shared how they dealt with the customer transition between Payment Revolution and ShopKeep when they got acquired.As usual, I'm excited to hear what you think of this episode, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear from you. You can email me directly on Andrew@churn.fm. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter.Churn FM is sponsored by Vitally, the all-in-one Customer Success Platform.

Jun 23, 2021 • 38min
EP 119 | Jeremey Donovan - How SalesLoft delight and retain customers by building fun, useful tools they give away.
Today on the show we have Jeremey Donovan, SVP of Revenue Strategy at SalesLoft.In this episode, Jeremey talks about his responsibilities as the SVP of Revenue Strategy at SalesLoft, what the word “Strategy” means to him and how he goes about implementing one. We also discussed how building free tools helps SalesLoft with lead gen, customer delight and ultimately retention, and Jeremey then shared some ideas he and his sales team implemented throughout the years to boost retention.As usual, I'm excited to hear what you think of this episode, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear from you. You can email me directly on Andrew@churn.fm. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter.Churn FM is sponsored by Vitally, the all-in-one Customer Success Platform.

Jun 16, 2021 • 35min
EP 118 | Fletcher Richman (Atlassian) - Halp’s effortless and unique land and expand strategy that boosts retention.
Today on the show we have Fletcher Richman, co-founder of Halp who now serves as the head of Product for Halp after the recent acquisition by Atlassian.In this episode, we talked about the role churn and retention rate when it comes to evaluating an investment opportunity. We then moved on to discuss what Halp is, the motivation behind building it, and how they made the decision to pivot from building an integration tool, to a standalone ticketing solution built on top of Slack and Microsoft teams.We also discussed how keeping it simple helps Halp measure churn and retention, and then dove into their unique and effortless land and expand strategy. We also chatted about how starting with small teams makes their sales process easier and gives them more opportunity for expansion. As usual, I'm excited to hear what you think of this episode, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear from you. You can email me directly on Andrew@churn.fm. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter.Churn FM is sponsored by Vitally, the all-in-one Customer Success Platform.

Jun 9, 2021 • 39min
EP 117 | Esben Friis-Jensen (Userflow) - How sale incentives drive net retention in customer success.
Today on the show we have Esben Friis-Jensen, co-founder and Chief Growth Officer at Userflow. In this episode, we talked about Esben’s experience building out the sales team at Cobalt and how they kicked their sales motion off the ground, what triggered the need for customer success 3 years in, and what the benefits are of having sales incentives as a customer success manager.We also discussed how customer video interviews keep the Cobalt team on the same page when it comes to their ideal customer profile, why product led growth led Esben to join Userflow, and we dove into how being late in the market helped differentiate Userflow from its competition. As usual, I'm excited to hear what you think of this episode, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear from you. You can email me directly on Andrew@churn.fm. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter.Churn FM is sponsored by Vitally, the all-in-one Customer Success Platform.

Jun 2, 2021 • 37min
EP 116 | Teresa Anania - How Zendesk is adapting best practices in product to customer success, and how it impacts churn and retention.
Today on the show we have Teresa Anania, VP of Global Customer Success and Renewals at Zendesk.In this episode, we talked about effective ways to measure the impact of Customer Success, how Zendesk runs “experimentation programs” within their CS team, and Teresa also explains why time to value is their go-to metric. We also discussed the role of a Practise Manager and their function within the team, how CS and sales work together in upsells and renewals, and how Zendesk makes sure to mitigate customer frustrations when being juggled between teams. As usual, I'm excited to hear what you think of this episode, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear from you. You can email me directly on Andrew@churn.fm. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter.Churn FM is sponsored by Vitally, the all-in-one Customer Success Platform.