Keynote Article: Uniting Customer Success and Customer Experience.

Introduction:

Over the past many years, debates have escalated on whether an organization should take first priority in Customer Experience or Customer Success or marry the subjects together when doing business. This has seen many persuasions being aired with such debates as many big corporate Directors have mentioned that CX is more important than CS and vice versa and some mention that the two subjects carry equal weight and hence they should be used hand in glove. Recently, as CX-Centric we have seen the importance of having such a discussion as we collaborated with some of the industry heavyweights to illustrate and explain why these two important subjects in business are inseparable.  With this discussion, we explore whether or not these two ( CX & CS) should be combined. Customer Success (CS) is basically a business method that ensures that customers achieve success, their desired outcomes while using the business products or services. On the other hand, CX is basically an interaction between an organization and its customers over the duration of their relationship hence one can deduce some similarities between these two imperative entities of an organization hence the reason the two should be combined. 

For this discussion, the focus was on the:

• Evolution of CS and CX

• Analysis CX and CS around the OPT-IN2

• Bridging CS and CX going forward

We had some of the greatest think tanks in the field of CS and CX for the discussion. The panel members of this discussion were Sue Nabeth Moore, Shreesha Ramdas, and Jonathan Daniels.

Introduction to Our Panellists:

Sue Nabeth Moore:

Moore is the Founder of Success Black Enterprise as well as the Co-Founder of Customer Success Mastermind. Her professional profile is versatile including multiple skills and experience in Sales, Marketing, Customer Success, Change Management, amongst other fields she is experienced in. Moore is also passionate about evangelizing Customer Success hence making her a befitting speaker for such a discussion. Her presentation amongst others included the following: the evolution of CX and CS, the definition of CX and CS, Why an organization should invest in both CX and CS, the overview of Framework, and finally Bridging the gap.

Shreesha Ramdas:

Shreesha is an Entrepreneurial executive with a track record of launching and growing products in competitive markets. General management experience in product development, Growth Hacking, and go-to-market strategy & execution. Shreesha is currently SVP & GM at Medallia. Shreesha has also held different positions in different verticals of different organizations. Shreesha was the CEO of Strikedeck, a leader in Customer Success Automation. Prior to that, Shreesha was the VP of Corp Dev & Partnerships at CallidusCloud. His presentation amongst others included the following: the evolution of CX and CS, How CX and CS are interdependent. 

Jonathan Daniels:

Jonathan is the founder and CEO of CX-Centric. He is a CCXP qualified via the CXPA. He specializes in helping organizations become Customer-Centric and allowing them to deliver better experiences to their customers. So this is about organizational transformation and governance. He has been in consulting for over a decade earning him a lot of practical experience in these areas. Some of the companies he has consulted at, include Lloyds Banking Group, Nissan, ING Bank, Sodexo, National Grid, and Network Rail. Jonathan is also the author of one of the best books in CX which is the Customer Experience Playbook.  His presentation amongst others included the following: Elaborating on the echo chamber effect, Defining organization, and customer-centricity.

Keynote Presentations:

Moore started off her presentation with the evolution of CX and CS, where she mentioned that CX was firstly adopted before CS and that CX was mainly used in the B2B companies and retail spaces. She further mentioned that CS started mainly in the USA where it was used mostly by B2B companies before being also adopted by B2C companies.  Moore further mentioned the common buzzwords used with the two entities where she said for Customer Experience, the common buzzwords are loyalty, moments of truth, and touchpoints. For Customer Success, the common buzzwords she mentioned included engagement model, health score, onboarding, trusted advisor, and CSM (Customer Success Manager).

Moreover in bringing the synergy between CX and CS, Moore used a formula to demonstrate this. The formula is given as CS ( Perception of Value ) = CX (Perception of Sentiment) + CO (Perception of Outcomes) [ Courtesy of Gainsight]. Moore also mentioned the reasons why companies should invest in both CX and CS. Here, Moore mentioned the main charters the two subjects (CX and CS) can achieve for the company if used together. These charters include optimizing opportunities (e.g create client advocates, retain customers, etc) and reducing risks (e.g minimize churn, minimize negative sentiment, etc). In bringing in the synergy between the two subjects, Moore further mentions that CS + CX is equivalent to the Customer-Centric DNA of the company.

Furthermore, Moore spoke about one of the most anticipated topics of her presentation which was about the CS-OPT-IN2 Framework. She mentions that Customer Centricity and Service Alignment are the strategic parts that a business should do when putting into place an organization of Customer Success. These two strategic pillars, she mentions that they are the glue that’s needed to guarantee the internal smooth running of an organization’s departments (e.g Marketing, Sales, etc.). It is after having these two strategic parts firmly in place that an organization can then begin the operationalization of Customer Success which is around the OPT-IN2 framework. 

Shreesha then took over to present about the CS Transitioning from Culture to Execution. Here, Shreesha puts it clear that to establish Customer Success Culture in an organization, it should be the work of the collective thus every employee and department is to contribute equally in making sure that the Culture is successfully established and maintained. When bringing about the execution of Customer Success, Shreesha mentions quick wins as part of the solution to make this part (Execution) of Customer Success an achievable reality. He mentions that quick wins are a way to get immediate consensus around the exception plans. To make sure that Customer Success is executed successfully, the execution plan must revolve around the following aspects: What is it that Customers prefer or Like? How big is your customer base? What are the options involved with the product service offering? etc.

Exuding so much passion and excitement, Jonathan clearly explained the relationship between CS and CX. Here, Jonathan mentioned some of the common topics with both CX and CS.

In concluding the presentation, the following was agreed upon concerning the uniting of Customer Success and Customer Experience:

• Professionals need to converge their strategic and operational best practices.

• Individuals need to stop evolving separately in echo chambers. 

• CX & CS need to thrive together as a top-down, outside-in strategy.

• Professionals from different fields need to join forces and learn from each other concerning CX & CS.