#CSH Episode 6:

⏱️ Timestamps:

00:00:00 - Intro

00:00:55 - Gratitude for 2024’s challenges

00:02:38 - Myriam's dilemma: CS without data

00:04:35 - Leveraging customer conversations

00:06:00 - Inviting others into CS calls

00:08:30 - Creativity in data collection

00:10:00 - Building trust in your data

00:12:55 - Emotional breakdowns in leadership

00:16:38 - Back to basics with Excel

00:18:51 - Identifying the right metrics

📺 Lifetime Value: Your Destination for GTM content

https://www.lifetimevaluemedia.com

💁‍♀️💁‍♂️ Connect with the hosts:

Kristi Faltorusso's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristiserrano/

Kristi's website: https://www.kristifaltorusso.com/

Stijn "Stino" Smet's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stijn-smet-%F0%9F%90%B3-330435a9/

Key topics: data, creativity, microsoft excel

[Kristi] (0:02 - 0:16)

I bet you, sales doesn't have no data. You need information to make informed decisions. There does need to be a leader who's having an honest conversation with other key stakeholders in the business about what that reality looks like.

[Stino] (0:27 - 0:55)

Hi everyone and welcome to the customer success hotline. A new episode for you today because it's like the first day after Thanksgiving and we're like we're so we need to be thankful for basically everything today. Like for you Kristi, the godmother of CS, for our family, for our listeners, for the community, for what a crazy ass year it has been for 2024.

Like I'm also thankful that we're at the end of 2024.

[Kristi] (0:56 - 1:20)

Like let's wrap it up. I'm like put a bow on this year. I am ready for a new year.

This is, it's been a year. But yes, expressing gratitude. We have, we do have, all right, so listen, for all the things that we can complain about, we do have so much to be grateful for.

And so I hope everyone who's listening, if you had a shit year like so many folks have, I hope you could find one, at least one thing to be grateful for.

[Stino] (1:21 - 1:28)

Yeah, 100%. But then again, I'm indeed so happy that I can wrap this up in three weeks and be like, see you next year.

[Kristi] (1:29 - 1:32)

Bye-bye. That's a wrap.

[Stino] (1:33 - 2:38)

But before we can wrap everything up, we have some great questions lined up. Well, question for this one, and this is all about data. So Myriam Hirt wants to know, well, she's working at a company where customer success is not taken seriously.

Where did we hear that before? Where they manage large numbers, secure large renewals, and drive a lot of new business. And it really is from the top level, so CEO, C-level, down to other departments, consultants, product sales, et cetera.

And data is not in a good status. So basically, what we've said in our previous episode, you can be emotional, but back it up with data. What if you want to be emotional, but we can't back it up with data?

Where do we make it clear where customer success is driving that value? And I think 2024 was so transformative for us, where we finally, I have a feeling, got a seat at the table talking about revenue and everything. So how do we do that without data in 2025?

[Kristi] (2:39 - 2:47)

I mean, like, this is just their leader needs to advocate for change. I bet you sales doesn't have no data, you know?

[Stino] (2:47 - 2:48)

All right.

[Kristi] (2:48 - 4:35)

But here's the reality. You need information to make informed decisions, right? That's just it at the end of the day.

So there does need to be a leader who's having an honest conversation with other key stakeholders in the business about what that reality looks like, right? We can't do X with our customers because we don't know why. We can't drive more growth because we don't know where to prioritize.

You can't run a business blind, and that's effectively what they're being asked to do. And so, listen, without going to advocate for this, I don't know that there's really a strong alternative. You have to go and advocate for it.

And I will say, if you have zero data, if you really have zero, zero, zero data, and there's nothing to go off of, one thing I will say that you could do, and it's not scalable and it's not going to work every time, document customer conversations and use that. For example, all of our calls are recorded these days, right? Everyone's calls, it's not just mine.

Okay. Everyone's calls are recorded these days. And so I'm like, I definitely know why people want to record my calls.

They want to know what I'm saying. Okay. Your calls are recorded.

Go find sound bites from your customers, go ask them specific questions, and then go and take those audio clips and send those short pieces of conversation over to your product team, over to your CEO, over to your executive, just so that they can get a sense of some of what you're talking about and what you're advocating for. Now, it's not going to solve all of your data problems, but at least it will start to help socialize the conversations that need to be having internally. So that's one little hack I can give you if you have no data.

But like I said, the only thing that your leadership should be doing at this point is really pushing for that. You need the right tools, you need the right systems in place, and you need to be capturing the right information.

[Stino] (4:36 - 6:00)

Yeah, 100%. And also the other thing on driving or like having that conversation or bringing that conversation to the table, even without any data, or even if you have data, but it's wrong data, it's inviting everyone. What I love, again, depending on the size of your company, because if you're working in like, let's say, a 100 employee company, that's a little bit more tricky.

But like, if you're working in startup scalability, then invite people into like your customer calls. Like that is the, that was the best way for me also to get that seat at the table that we're driving revenue, and that we, that customer success isn't just a cost center, because I think it already starts with your upper level or your other departments that they don't really get what customer success is all about. So there is where you don't need to have data, like you really can educate your teams, your C-level, or your manager can teach their C-level what CS is all about, because that question reeks of leadership not knowing what CS is about.

They're not fully grasping what CS is about. They think like the traditional ones, right? Like you're here to make our customers happy, and we don't lose any money.

Like that is like, that's child's play. That is CS 2012 or 2010, when we first gave birth, when you first gave birth to the customer success profession.

[Kristi] (6:00 - 6:01)

That was not me.

[Stino] (6:01 - 6:02)

You know me.

[Kristi] (6:02 - 8:29)

I like to come a couple of years later. You're right. Like there is things that we can do there.

I mean, listen, here's the other thing. If it comes down to budgeting, because I feel like that's also an issue, right? Like people don't have the money, the tools, the resources.

And so it could be we can't buy the right tools right now. So I'm also wondering if like Myriam is an earlier stage company where it's like we don't have the budget right now to fund the right tools, or we don't have the right people to go and get these systems and tools in place, or if there is just another project that is a top priority right now. I mean, I think that there's something to consider there as well.

I don't think that organizations, and I don't think that leaders want to be driving their business blindly. So I'm wondering if there is something else that is prohibiting them from getting these things in place today. And so what I'd also say is like, are there cheap alternatives?

Are there other things you can do? Like, are there creative ways that you can go and find or get access to information? There are logs, right?

Like I'm sure that your product, if it's a SaaS product, right, maybe you have logs with data in it. Can you get access to that? Like, I guess here's my thing.

Are there creative ways that we can do things if it's a cost thing, if it's a resource thing that is inexpensive? Like I say this all the time, and nobody wants to believe me, but I'm going to keep saying it. Excel is the most powerful tool in the universe.

Nobody wants to do it. It's manual as hell. I get that.

I get that. It gives everyone the ick. It gives me the ick.

I don't want to do it. But if you have nothing, go put all your stuff in Excel. And then you as a team go, I know it sucks.

I know it sucks. I know it sucks. Enter it in the field.

So go put the data in manually. And at least you have something. And even if you said, you know what, I'm going to go put it in for our top 30 customers, our top 50 customers, not all your customers, but say, you know what, the top cohort, at least of the customers representing our revenue, we're going to make sure that as a team, we are aligned.

We're going to use Excel to capture everything we need. And then guess what? Excel does make charts and graphs and pretty things and you can figure it out.

And so I know it's not ideal. I think here's the other thing. I think sometimes as customer success professionals, we lose our creativity, right?

Because we know that we can be spoiled with tools and all of these things and throw a little money at it. And there is something out there for everything. Sometimes though, you just have to be gritty and you have to be creative and you have to figure out how to do these things with what you have today.

And if what you have today is nothing, start with that.

[Stino] (8:30 - 9:59)

Yeah. And on top of that, you have these things like ChatsCPT or Gemini, where you basically, if you have that data in Excel, because sometimes now, again, we all use CSPs or those fancy tools to throw money against, but sometimes you need to go back to the basics where you export data or having those logs or just having it manually and then upload it to things like ChatsCPT and ask to drive correlations or predictions or anything else in between.

So in that sense, it's easy to make sure that you will always have data, whether if it's manual, whether if it's automated. And if you don't have access to the automated way, yeah, then you need to revert back to the early human days where you just have even pen and paper. But yeah, ChatsCPT for me, for instance, there is only so much a tool can do.

You have, again, great CSPs, you have great AI tools nowadays to really basically do everything. But sometimes you need to go back to the basics and you start from raw data that comes from your development team that says like, here are the logs for this client. And now you need to clean that shit up and do all kinds of stuff in that.

So in that sense, yeah, 100% is like, even if you have data tools, nothing is a given. Nothing is a given because even if you have data, who says that the data is correct?

[Kristi] (10:00 - 11:52)

Right. We always talk about accuracy, currency, right? And a lot of folks actually, this is my favorite question to ask folks.

Anytime I'm doing a presentation, I always say, who here trusts your data? And you know what's interesting? Nobody ever raises their hand.

It's always like three people. And I'm always like, yeah, I think you're all delirious and delusional, but nobody raises their hand because you know what's interesting is that even people that have access to data, they don't trust it. So there's something to be said about that too.

So listen, I think we gave you a bunch of ideas, things that you can do, ways that you can go get creative with this. I think the last piece that I will lean into is if you're able to do what Stino said or do what I did, which is use Excel or go to an AI tool and start to find trends, find insights, go get access to your logs, all of the creative, like free things we just told you, Hey, like go do these things. They're time consuming.

So I know that time is not free, but it's not going to cost you any additional revenue. Go put some of that to action. So here's the other compelling thing.

Go find some data that's going to move the needle and then you know what's going to happen. Everyone's going to want more of that. And that's when you start to get funding.

So like, let's also say we want to bring things back to business impact. So it's not even enough to just have the data to socialize it, to see it, to, to use it, put it to work for you and then show a result and say, Hey, listen, I went, I dug, it took me hours to get this thing. Here's what I did.

Here's how I've been doing this. But I did this. And now for these five customers, we were able to get ahead of something.

We retained a customer who was at risk that we didn't know they were at risk. We grew a customer who was in a position to grow. We got a customer to be an advocate, right?

Like go find some of the business impact that you guys are all trying to drive and then go show how you did it manually and then say, Hey, if you want more of this, we can do that.

[Stino] (11:52 - 11:53)

But here's what we need.

[Kristi] (11:53 - 12:10)

Right? Give it a taste. Give me the money.

Just a little bit. And then all of a sudden, all of a sudden, maybe your project gets funded. So, or you can just complain to that.

That's Stephanie. You could just do that. We're not here to tell you what to do, but we gave you some ideas as an alternative.

[Stino] (12:11 - 12:19)

Maybe complaining. Like, let's imagine like day in, day out, like you're really, if you complain enough about it though, somebody's going to be like, you know what?

[Kristi] (12:19 - 12:27)

I just, I can't this anymore. I can't listen to this person complain. And you'll get it.

It's how I get things in my house. If I want new bags or new shoes, you just complain.

[Stino] (12:27 - 12:37)

Maybe, maybe sometimes we need to have like an existential crisis. Maybe do like yell and cry in the boardroom. No, don't do that.

But like, I imagine sometimes like I want to do that.

[Kristi] (12:37 - 12:55)

Like sometimes I'm sure somebody's done it. We'd like to hear from you. If you've ever had a real breakdown in a boardroom, I'm just interested in how that went and what the outcome was.

So we'd love to have you as maybe a third guest for a recorded episode. If you're out there listening, come tell your story.

[Stino] (12:55 - 12:56)

You will not be anonymous.

[Kristi] (12:56 - 13:02)

The story will not be anonymous. Your company will not be anonymous. There's no anonymity here, but would love to hear it.

[Stino] (13:03 - 13:12)

Yeah. I would love just like, sometimes I want to have that feeling of going into a boardroom and then just yell like, you're not hearing me. And then like, right.

[Kristi] (13:12 - 13:24)

Like a big, like Jerry Maguire type, like breakdown where you take the fish. If anyone I don't know how old everybody is, maybe you remember Jerry Maguire. He took the fish, the fish went with him.

So did Dorothy, the accountant.

[Stino] (13:25 - 14:51)

Anyway. Sometimes, yeah. But back to the question.

No, but I do love that because I love the fact that what you touched upon is that go for the data that moves the needle. Like, because my immediate instance would be like, I need to track how many times they logged in. I need to track how many users that they have.

Like that is all fine, but that is like additional data. Like look at the product and indeed look at what like influences the churn or the expansion and go from that because that indeed moves the needle. If you're going to your CEO and be like, Hey, I've tracked seven hours, which this client has logged in.

Like he would have been able to see that as well in the backend of a product. You want to make sure that you're tracking users or events or attributes that make sense and that move the needle. And indeed that is something, an additional tip.

Like if you need to do it manually, go for the data that is like, we'll take you straight over the finish line. And I think that is the, the, the most important thing, but like we're giving away notebooks and pens. If anyone there is still working on Excel or manual, like let's, we will make you some notebooks and some pens of the customer success offline.

[Kristi] (14:51 - 15:20)

Yeah. That's we need to get you some gifts, but either way, I think what we all agreed on is keep advocating for it. You need to run the business, understand what the delays are or why it's not getting funded or why you can't get access to it or what's happening right now, just to educate yourself, see what you can do to help continue to advocate for what you need to be successful and find ways to just demonstrate impact with the data that you do have.

So maybe that will help them want to, to move this project forward for you.

[Stino] (15:21 - 16:38)

Yeah, 100%. And also when it comes to like manage large numbers or manage large renewals, that is already data. It's maybe not product usage data, but it is data.

I'm saying like, if people start to churn because you like manage large numbers, like that is your data. Like our churn, I've lost five customers because I did this, this, and this, like that is also data. Don't see data as only stuff that comes from your product's backend.

Data is like literally the meetings on your Google or Outlook calendar that you can easily export. It is the amount of emails that you get every day. It's the amount of churn requests or the expand requests that you get.

That is also data. So in that sense, you always have access to data, whether if that's product backend or not, like start with yourself and map that out from that point in time or that point of view, because it's then easier to also ask for other data points of other departments. Because if you ask it to them, it's like, why?

But if you start from your own point of view and you're like, yeah, there's many accounts, I had that many meetings, and these clients churned, I want to know a little bit more about like, let's say, product usage data or maybe sales data. It's as simple as that.

[Kristi] (16:39 - 16:40)

You make it sound simple.

[Stino] (16:44 - 17:44)

Sometimes we don't need to make stuff harder than it already is. When it comes to like, very basic, like going back to the basics on how basically this profession was founded. Sometimes it's like, it's refreshing to go back to basics.

Because again, sometimes we go so into the nitty gritty of all of it that we're lost in all the data that we have. Like, for example, I have access to data, which I 70% trust, like everything in my life. Like the scale I'm putting myself on, also 70% that I'm trusting.

But that's the thing though, even like I have access to so much data. But I even get lost in it. Sometimes it's even for me super hard with having access to all of that data to make impact or like me, like shift the needle.

So I go back into that Excel and go back to like the first things that I've learned as a CISM to...

[Kristi] (17:44 - 18:51)

Well, you have to distill the data down to figure out what are the right metrics, right? Because we can all have this analysis paralysis when it comes down to too much data. We need to just figure out like, what is the important stuff?

And I say this, listen, we work with a lot of people building out like their health scores, for example. I think this is a place where people I'm like, why are those the metrics that you're putting in your health score? And most people don't even know, right?

They're doing things because somebody else did it or because they're guessing. And I have like a really, I have a fundamental issue with that. Because I'm like, those are not your data points though.

Those are not the things that should be important to your business. For example, like I love when people are like, oh, engagement, like we want to make sure that we have at least one call per month with a customer. I'm like, why?

Or is that even scale for your team? Or how are you, like, what's the value of that conversation? Do you even know if it's a good conversation?

Does that matter? So it's also like, please be thoughtful about like, what is the information that's important to your business, to your customers? What is that really telling us?

Is it the right information? Because it's easy to just have a lot of data, like you said. And it's, you know, it's even easy to have just any data.

[Stino] (18:51 - 20:00)

That is a beautiful note to end this episode on. Myriam, I hope like every other episode that we record that we answered your question. We just had a small roundup.

Like, indeed, like, if you want to be taken seriously at the table with your CEO or at the other departments, it's like that data, even if it's not good, even if you don't have access to use the tips of this episode. But also like, make yourself more visible, grab them into client calls, share customer stories, like all of these small things, like those soft skills wise. That's also definitely something that you can like bring a difference within the company.

Like I constantly be like, like shout on how a client call went. And that is the like, again, the basic stuff that you want, like, like stock slack, like be that over spotlight achiever and be like, I had this client call, this client call. So in that sense, that also very much helps when it comes putting CS on the map.

Anyway, thank you so much, everyone, again, for listening into the Customer Success Hotline. And let's speak soon. Bye-bye.

[Kristi] (20:01 - 20:02)

Bye, guys.