What surveys or assessments are you using for your Customer Success team (CSMs)?

Successful_lion · 2024-03-28T18:33:18+00:00

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Hey GGR folks! We are exploring a survey or assessment to evaluate if our customers are getting value from their relationship with their assigned CSM and if they believe they will be successful with our product.

I have a couple of questions I've been exploring through the community and have read some posts already. If you have an opinion about any of these, please reply.

Touchpoints

We are exploring surveys through key points in a customer's lifecycle.

What touch points are you surveying at? Why?
Do you survey at touch points or during specific time frames? Why? (eg: after 90, 180, days vs after onboarding)
Do you base the touch point off the Account or the individual? (eg: if you're surveying 90 days after a customer is onboarded, is it based off when the Account is onboarded or 90 days after your relationship with an individual?)

Individual vs Account

Contacts change over time, but the Account stays the same.

Do you survey everyone in the Account? How do you deal with turn-over in contacts?
Do your surveys follow the individual (Contact)? Why?

Survey Type

What survey or assessment are you using for your customer success managers? Why did you choose it?
How do you use the data from that survey combined with other surveys like NPS, pNPS, etc?

CSM Bonus tied to Survey

Some posts in the community reference that basing a bonus on a survey after onboarding is a bad idea…

Do you tie a bonus to a CSM's survey results? How has that been received?
Are the survey results just a part of the total variables that are considered in the bonus?
What type of survey are you using?

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Comments

Successful_lion

@Ed Powers I thought I replied earlier; my apologies. Thank you for the thoughtful response! You've made great points I am taking into consideration as I build out this model. Appreciate your time and expertise.

Ed Powers

@Successful_lion, gathering data from members of an account’s Decision-Making Unit after a Moment of Proof is good practice, and it’s something I strongly recommend to my consulting clients. Not only is it a good idea to ensure the DMU member(s) agree they have obtained the value they expected, it’s an excellent opportunity to check their level of trust in the CSM and the company they represent. I have seen both realized value and trust metrics be predictive of future renewal behaviors, and it may be the case for you, too.

I suggest you experiment, collecting data manually if necessary, and validate the hypothesis using statistical analysis. If you see a significant relationship between the measurement and subsequent retention or expansion, then you have grounds to make it an operational KPI.

Apply good survey design practices to collect the data. @Steve Bernstein is an expert in this area and perhaps he can add more insights. Regarding trust, scientists say it’s comprised of perceived ability (knowledge and skills), benevolence (genuinely care about me) and integrity (doing the right thing), so questions pertaining to these aspects can serve as an index.

Regarding incentives, I suggest you first determine if CSM motivation is a problem. I’ve found that people want to do a good job, but they need to know what a good job looks like. Then they need the knowledge, ability (skills, workflow, information, tools, etc.) and reinforcement (KPI feedback and coaching) to make the new behaviors stick.