Self-help and service automation (e.g. chatbots) provide a means to save money and lower the overall costs of service delivery.  Consider however that savings from deflection represents an opportunity to reinvest to improve service outcomes by reallocating staff to high value activities (e.g. onboarding, adoption, retention, expansion, etc.).  This article introduces the top opportunities to reinvest in service.

If there is one service performance indicator to steer by it is RETENTION. You can have plenty of satisfied customers but still not grow, but you can’t grow unless you retain the customers you have.

Less NPS / More High-Touch Understanding

We have become too dependent on electronic surveys and NPS/CSat scores to tell us that our customers are okay. These are fine indicators but do not always tell us why we lose customers. Frankly many of the customers we lose may never have shared feedback through voice of the customer campaigns.

To mitigate churn, we need to dig deeper to understand why a customer stops (or never starts) using a product or why they do not perceive value from the services they pay for.

The best way to do this – pick up the phone or visit your customers and listen to their concerns! Don’t wait for customers to cancel before engaging them.

How We Keep Customers

Not every relationship can (or should) be retained, but if you listen carefully enough you will find that you can address many top churn factors.  Onboarding, adoption, success planning and account management are all powerful tools to mitigate risk factors.

Principles and practices of customer success are taking us in the right direction with an emphasis on retaining existing relationships. We need to make certain that we avoid the temptations to rely too much on tech-touch and keep personal channels of communication open with customers – especially the ones we do not hear from on a regular basis.

The Bottom Line

Retention of both relationships and revenue are critical indicators of business health.  Understand retention levels and underlying factors that influence them. Retention is paramount – make it a strategic priority!

Why aren’t you renewing more of your service contracts. The most common reasons for non-renewal are: Lack of perceived value; a customer stops using your product; a product reaches maturity; or poor service quality. Non-renewal is also caused by poor renewal practices. This article introduces the top reasons for non-renewal and offers practical advice for how to improve renewal rates.

Tuesday October 30, 2018

The SaaS Report (TSR) announced its Top Women Leaders in SaaS of 2018. TSR received over 3,500 nominations on behalf of hundreds of women leaders. Leadership was assessed across several key areas including integrity, intelligence, drive, company culture, and company growth, and  other areas.

Among those recognized is Jennifer MacIntosh, Vice President of Customer Experience at Coveo Software.  Many of you may know Jen, for those that do not she is a technology services icon and thought leader.  Congratulations to Jen and all who are recognized.

Wednesday October 22, 2018

Gainsight announced that it has signed an agreement to acquire Aptrinsic.  The acquisition offers capabilities to help product teams figure out which features to add or enhance based on customer adoption and usage insights.

It makes sense to integrate the teams that help customers use products with the team that can provide the features customers need most to be successful.

Using an accurate measure of deflection is imperative. If not measured correctly it is easy to overstate the impact of self-help and service automation on assisted support demand.

The average rate of case deflection within the technology industry is 23%. This article defines deflection and provides a step by step guide to implement a reliable deflection metric.

This Service Innovation profile highlights IBM’s use of its own Watson technologies as a platform to deliver a new approach to service delivery – Cognitive Support.
Through the Service Innovation Series, ServiceXRG highlights examples of innovative approaches to achieve service excellence.

Coordination and cooperation across customer facing departments makes good business sense. So why aren’t more companies creating unified post-sales organizations? ServiceXRG examines the current state of Service and Sales cooperation and the forces at work that are driving organizational transformation. This study reveals how the isolated sales and service silos of the past can evolve to drive Customer Success.

Organizational silos create barriers to customer success by inhibiting the levels of coordination and cooperation necessary to retain and grow customer relationships. If you cannot achieve the necessary level of inter-department cooperation within your current post-sales organizational structure it’s time to tear down your silos.

Technology vendors that rely on partners to perform critical service functions must have a well-defined and executed channel strategy to maximize service sales effectiveness and sustain customer loyalty. This article outlines the steps necessary to optimize services through channel partners and introduces several research studies for channel management best practices.