What is customer success: CX Mini Masterclass – E49

Welcome to Decoding the customer, a podcast about customer experience and how to realize customer-centric change in today’s dynamic business world. I’m Julia Ahlfeldt, certified customer experience professional, business advisor, and host of this program. Thanks so much for tuning in. If you’re new to the show, welcome.

If you’re a returning listener, thanks, and it’s great to have you back. This episode is part of my CX Mini Masterclass series here on Decoding the customer. These weekly episodes are published each Thursday and designed to be punchy, bite-size overviews of key customer experience concepts and ideas for how you can help your organization thrive through customer centricity. Whether you’re new to the field of customer experience, are preparing for the CCXP exam, or are a seasoned professional looking to brush up on a few basics, this series will help you improve your knowledge, skills, and performance to stand out as a CX professional.

If you’re keen to do some more intensive online training in the field of customer experience, stay tuned at the end of this episode for an exclusive listener discount code from our show sponsor, CX University. This is episode 49. During the month of august, the show has been focusing on a lot of topics related to change. In the last episode, I had the opportunity to bring in a great guest expert and I’m going to do so for the next episode as well.

But for this one, I’m exploring how the field of customer experience is growing and evolving. Specifically, with regards to the evolution of customer success teams and the role that these teams play in customer experience. I think it’s pretty widely accepted that customer experience first gained traction in the B2C world. But as B2B companies are starting to focus on customer experience, they’ll also need to define how the teams within their organization contribute to customer experience.

Central to all of this is the customer success team. In this episode, I’m going to explain the typical customer success team function, clarify how this differs from the service team in the B2C world, and then we’ll explore the role of customer success within the context of customer experience management. If you’re keen to learn about the heart and soul of the customer journey in B2B customer experience, then stay tuned. And as always, if you’re out and about while listening to this episode and here’s something that you’d like to remember later, don’t worry about writing it down.

You can find an overview of the key concepts that we’ve covered today in the show notes for this episode, which are on my website, juliaahlfeldt.com or decodingthecustomer.com. Earlier this year, I gave a webinar for software as a service customer success teams, specifically on customer centricity. As any CX professional worth her salt, I did some research in advance to understand my customers and their needs. As I gained a deeper appreciation for what these teams do, I began to realize that just as marketing and customer operations teams were the source of many CX functions within the B2C space, that customer success teams were likely to become the genesis for CX functions in the B2B world.

For those who are unfamiliar with what a customer success team does, I’ll try to break it down for you. As mentioned earlier, customer success is mostly a feature in the B2B world. Often where there’s an ongoing client need or a subscription-based service offering. These teams are usually responsible for protecting and cultivating the client relationship, as well as delivering client outcomes.

Once a sales team has acquired the customer, the relationship is then transitioned to a customer success team, if there is one. This team is then responsible for keeping customers happy and engaged. These teams can sometimes be tasked with onboarding new clients, and they’re definitely tasked with retaining and renewing and growing the business with those clients. customer success teams are the beating heart of a client’s customer journey once the sales process is over.

Personally, I see a blurring of the lines between what you might think of as an account manager and what a customer success manager might do, especially after that initial customer acquisition is over. Unlike traditional B2C customer service, which is usually reactive, responding to a specific customer issue or query as it arises, customer success teams usually have some more proactive, ongoing engagement with their clients, in addition to the issue problem-solving. Besides the once-off, cheeky, cross-sell during a service call, B2C customer service teams are rarely tasked with growing a customer’s business. Retention, yes, customer growth, rarely.

customer success teams, on the other hand, are often also responsible for understanding a client’s needs and then deepening this client’s relationship with the brand through other products and services, if that’s appropriate. Now, if you’re a customer experience professional listening to this, you may have already connected the dots between the role of customer success and overall customer experience management. Essentially, the customer success team is one of the most, if not the most important touch points for the customer in the B2B setting. Besides the client’s interaction with the product or service itself, customer success is probably the most important point of contact with the brand.

That’s a huge responsibility. In terms of CX management, customer success teams will be an important source of customer insights, and they can be a powerful voice for customer advocacy within the organization. But just as CX teams are typically separate from customer service teams, it’s important to create a distinction between the two in a B2B setting. If not, you run the risk of the rest of the business viewing customer experience as that team over there’s responsibility, which we all know is a slippery, slippery slope.

If you’re still struggling with a distinction between customer experience and customer success, I think that a safe way to think about it is that the customer experience function is often strategic in nature, while the customer success team is typically more tactical. Both will work towards the same end goal, but through slightly different means and with different responsibilities. Do you work for a customer success team? If so, how do you see your role as part of your organization’s customer experience ecosystem?

Let me know. I’d love to hear your feedback. Thanks so much for listening today. If you’re enjoying the show, please share the program with others who might be interested, or head on over to iTunes and rate the podcast.

This helps others find the show. I’ll be back next Thursday with another CX Mini Masterclass. Be sure to tune in or subscribe to the show for updates when new episodes go live. Are you keen to do some more intensive online training in the field of customer experience?

If so, I’d encourage you to check out CX University. They offer a broad array of e-learning options that you can access anywhere and anytime. Their offering includes practice tests for the CCXP exam, and they’re a customer experience professionals association accredited resource and training provider, meaning that their materials have been reviewed and vetted by the association for alignment to the six core competencies that are in the exam. And what’s better is that all this is available in a flexible monthly subscription plan, meaning that you don’t have to fork over hundreds of dollars to get started.

As of the time of publishing this episode, plans including CX courses and practice exam questions start at just $75 per month. And listeners of the podcast can use the discount code podcast10 to get 10% off the first month’s subscription and help support the show. I’ll be back next Thursday. If you’d like to get in touch in the meantime, you can send me an email, tweet, or LinkedIn message.

My handle is at Julia Ahlfeldt, and my full contact details are also listed on my website, juliaahlfeldt.com or decodingthecustomer.com.