Gainsight's Buyer's Guide to Customer Success Solutions Companion Doc

11 steps to evaluate if a Customer Success Management (CSM) platform is right for your organization.

Mickey Alon

What’s in this doc

👉 Start with Key Steps & Business Challenges

As more businesses move to recurring revenue models, companies are investing in Customer Success teams to drive retention, expansion, and advocacy in their client bases. And just as firms have invested in Sales Automation and Enablement to drive sales productivity and Marketing Automation to increase marketing effectiveness, hundreds of organizations have invested in Customer Success Management (CSM) solutions to minimize churn, increase retention, and maximize client lifetime value. According to a Gainsight Customer Success Index Benchmark survey, we found that optimizing Customer Success operations led to an 18-point expansion in net retention driven by reduced churn and increased upsell. Recent research shows that close to 70% of organizations now have a dedicated customer success function in their company, and another study finds that robust CS expansion drives improved retention, renewal rates— and exponential growth. The same survey found that customer success investments often generate an increase in account values, too. Yet another ROI-boosting opportunity? Leveraging analytics to improve CS outcomes. For any reasonably scaled business, then, investing in a CSM solution can create a

multi-million dollar opportunity

Customer Success teams need to think carefully about when, where, and how to deploy a CSM solution for the greatest business impact. That being said, most mature Customer Success organizations find that there’s no perfect moment for deployment. They say that instead of waiting, it’s best to move fast and iterate as you go.

We had to start putting the customer at the center of everything we did. We needed to demonstrate differentiated value and create a positive experience for our customers... We knew it would take more than just data to make this shift. We needed a platform to enable it. My team was able to get leadership buy-in. They heard what we wanted to prioritize on a strategic level and we listened to the CSMs to figure out how to make it work tactically. - Laura Salonga, athenahealth

What’s in this doc

Good planning is at the heart of every successful CSM platform deployment. Here’s our 11-step outline for developing a well-thought-out timeline and a step-by-step process:

Step

Description

1. Evaluation Team

Identify the cross-functional evaluation team.

2. Business Case

Create a business case based on Return on Investment (ROI) and Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) to help quantify the business value of a potential investment.

3. Project Plan

Define your evaluation project plan.

Use this doc as a starting point

If you haven’t been through a procurement process at your company, research what was involved for making comparable decisions

Do you have a standard vendor audit process? A security review? A compliance review?

4. Vendor Research

Determine your shortlist by reading online reviews, talking to peers, and reading analyst reports.

5. Request For Proposal (RFP)

Create evaluation requirements for the RFP

Send the RFP to potential vendors

Review responses

Score responses

Narrow your list to the finalists

6. Solution Presentations

We recommend planning for three meetings—ideally, all on the same day for logistical convenience:

Management/End User Demo + Road-map Review

Technical Architecture + Demo

Executive Demo + Business Case Presentation

7. References

Conduct reference checks and read online reviews of the finalists.

8/9. POC & Solution Design

If needed, we recommend conducting a “Proof of Concept” to make sure the solution works for you. Define a detailed scoping of the project to understand costs and timing.