Why Does Your Business Need Customer Success?

Why Does Your Business Need Customer Success?

Why Does Your Business Need Customer Success?

Hear Bianca Ker – Senior Director of Customer Success at Tagger Media – and Tracy Shouldice – Director of Customer Success at Trend Micro explain why Customer Success exists and how it has become a business-critical function.

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Bianca Ker — The skills that it takes to sell a product are definitely different than the skills that it takes to help truly educate in a deep way and evangelize the product over a long period of time. Trying to mash all of those things into one organization and too many KPIs isn't good for the customer. I don't wanna try and make my Customer Success Managers (CSMs) salespeople and hunters, and I don't wanna try and make my hunters CSMs. They're different people, they've got different skillsets and I think it's done really well because it actually makes the customer happier. Things that don't make the customer happier, don't last very long, basically.

Tracy Shouldice — In our case, the burning platform was retention and churn. We did some data analysis and we had three tiers of our commercial customers. The bottom tier, the long tail tier the churn rate was in the high teens, in some regions, low teens and others. So it's 15 to 20%, let's say, of those accounts. You're losing them. And we didn't know why. We had no handle on why we were pretty sure it was predictable and something we could do something about, but we needed people who cared about that versus letting them go and then trying to sell to new customers. It's like you're trying to bail a boat that's got a hole in the bottom with a bucket, and water just keeps coming in. So it was more about retention, but now that we're starting to mature, we're also seeing CS as an engine for expansion and obviously renewal.


“If you do a good job of onboarding and having those CS conversations, the renewal starts to take care of itself.”

Tracy Shouldice

Director of Customer Success

Trend Micro

Bianca Ker — The skills that it takes to sell a product are definitely different than the skills that it takes to help truly educate in a deep way and evangelize the product over a long period of time. Trying to mash all of those things into one organization and too many KPIs isn't good for the customer. I don't wanna try and make my Customer Success Managers (CSMs) salespeople and hunters, and I don't wanna try and make my hunters CSMs. They're different people, they've got different skillsets and I think it's done really well because it actually makes the customer happier. Things that don't make the customer happier, don't last very long, basically.

Tracy Shouldice — In our case, the burning platform was retention and churn. We did some data analysis and we had three tiers of our commercial customers. The bottom tier, the long tail tier the churn rate was in the high teens, in some regions, low teens and others. So it's 15 to 20%, let's say, of those accounts. You're losing them. And we didn't know why. We had no handle on why we were pretty sure it was predictable and something we could do something about, but we needed people who cared about that versus letting them go and then trying to sell to new customers. It's like you're trying to bail a boat that's got a hole in the bottom with a bucket, and water just keeps coming in. So it was more about retention, but now that we're starting to mature, we're also seeing CS as an engine for expansion and obviously renewal.


“If you do a good job of onboarding and having those CS conversations, the renewal starts to take care of itself.”

Tracy Shouldice

Director of Customer Success

Trend Micro

Bianca Ker — The skills that it takes to sell a product are definitely different than the skills that it takes to help truly educate in a deep way and evangelize the product over a long period of time. Trying to mash all of those things into one organization and too many KPIs isn't good for the customer. I don't wanna try and make my Customer Success Managers (CSMs) salespeople and hunters, and I don't wanna try and make my hunters CSMs. They're different people, they've got different skillsets and I think it's done really well because it actually makes the customer happier. Things that don't make the customer happier, don't last very long, basically.

Tracy Shouldice — In our case, the burning platform was retention and churn. We did some data analysis and we had three tiers of our commercial customers. The bottom tier, the long tail tier the churn rate was in the high teens, in some regions, low teens and others. So it's 15 to 20%, let's say, of those accounts. You're losing them. And we didn't know why. We had no handle on why we were pretty sure it was predictable and something we could do something about, but we needed people who cared about that versus letting them go and then trying to sell to new customers. It's like you're trying to bail a boat that's got a hole in the bottom with a bucket, and water just keeps coming in. So it was more about retention, but now that we're starting to mature, we're also seeing CS as an engine for expansion and obviously renewal.


“If you do a good job of onboarding and having those CS conversations, the renewal starts to take care of itself.”

Tracy Shouldice

Director of Customer Success

Trend Micro

Bianca Ker — It costs something like three or five times as much to get a new customer as it takes to retain.

Tracy Shouldice — I also show our employees in other functions what percentage of our commercial revenue comes from existing customers, and it blows their mind. I asked them to guess and they're like, oh, 40, 50%. I'm like, would you believe 90%. And we're not even doing a great job of it. Could you imagine what that NRR would look like if we really put some effort?

Bianca Ker — It costs something like three or five times as much to get a new customer as it takes to retain.

Tracy Shouldice — I also show our employees in other functions what percentage of our commercial revenue comes from existing customers, and it blows their mind. I asked them to guess and they're like, oh, 40, 50%. I'm like, would you believe 90%. And we're not even doing a great job of it. Could you imagine what that NRR would look like if we really put some effort?

Tracy Shouldice

Director of Customer Success

Trend Micro

Tracy is a seasoned Customer Experience (CX) professional with almost 40 years' experience in technology firms and research & advisory services, including over 13 years at Trend Micro where he currently holds the position of Director of Industry Analyst Relations Operations. Before Trend Micro, Tracy held senior advisor positions at Forrester in both the CIO Group and Customer Experience Council.

Bianca Ker

Head of Global Operations & CS

Tagger by Sprout Social

Bianca is a global customer success leader with over 10 years of experience driving post-sales growth in SaaS and marketing tech. At Tagger, she serves as Head of Global Operations & CS, where she joined the executive team pre-Series A and played a key role in the company’s acquisition by Sprout Social. Previously, she led global customer success at Tagger, and has held senior roles at Panoramic and Snaps (exited to Quiq). Known for aligning CS with strategic outcomes, Bianca brings operational depth, GTM insight, and a sharp focus on customer expansion.