CSMs as Content Providers

Pam Micznik

Several CS thought leaders have opined that CS professionals should spend up to 30% of their time writing content. I am curious about: 

• What type of content should CS professionals write?  
• For whom?  
• How should the content be distributed?  
• How should it be maintained?  
• How to determine how much content should be delivered and to whom?
• How would this content be different from what is produced by Marketing and / or Customer Education teams? 

In the best of worlds, company leaders require extreme collaboration. While each team has their specific responsibilities, their skills, perspectives, and experiences contribute to the overall customer experience that must be shared to build and maintain successful customer journeys. CS professionals understand the customer perhaps more intimately than any other group. 

Still, while CS professionals must be great communicators, it does not mean that every CS professional should be creating content. 

CSMs as trainers: Too many people think that if they can do something, they can teach it. However, too often, they are lecturing and not teaching. This means that the users are informed but not inspired to take action that leads to adoption. 

CSMs as writers: Too much content can be overwhelming. In an ideal world CS / Sales / Marketing / Customer Education should work together to coordinate content delivery. While blogging is a great way to build a personal brand, it is not always professional enough to reflect well on the company they represent.

 What is your experience and / or thoughts about how CS teams should contribute to content creation? 

PiperWilson

These are excellent questions! I've got nothing to contribute yet. I'll keep thinking.

himanshu

I decided to shake things up with my CS team through a little experiment. The mission? Everyone was to craft a blog post about what they teach and communicate to customers. I set two deadlines to spice up the challenge.

Out of 22 CSMs, only 5 hit the first deadline, leaving the rest in the dust. When I probed for reasons, the responses were a mixed bag: overflowing client queries, client meetings across the map, tackling backlogs, or simply the enigmatic 'just couldn’t get to it.' By the second deadline, 2 more managed to cross the finish line, though the rest echoed the earlier chorus of reasons.

This exercise wasn't just for kicks; it was a litmus test to uncover the content creators among us. Those with a knack for writing? They've now got a new gig—boosting our marketing efforts with case studies, enriching our knowledge base, and jazzing up our blog and LinkedIn with some personal branding flair.

As for the rest, they're diving into a different creative pool: producing video content, crafting tutorial videos, and enriching our academy. Turns out, there's more than one way to tell our story, and I've got the best crew to do it.

PiperWilson

Turns out, there's more than one way to tell our story, and I've got the best crew to do it.

Love this!

David Ellin

OK, @Pam Micznik, I'm going to upset the apple cart.

I agree that CSMs need to have some writing skills. They write emails to customers and need to create concise decks for business reviews.

For me, content creation (from a CSM perspective) should be about generating ideas for content and not writing or designing the content themselves. Leave that to our expert marketing partners.

CSMs already have more than they can handle on their plates and their focus should be engaging with customers, providing value, and validating Impact.

Who disagrees?

Pam Micznik

@himanshu - Love the experiment to see if your CSMs wanted to write and how well they did.

@PiperWilson - Definitely true, so many ways to tell a story. And, as a content creator, I NEED CSMs stories. I always go to CSMs to learn and consolidate best practices that can be distilled into course work.

@David Ellin - Thank you for confirming my belief that CSMs already have a huge lift to coach and support their customers.