SaaS Customer Success 101, Tools & Best Practices
Denis Shatalin
Founder of SaaS Camp
Do you know the easiest way to stand out in the competitive world of SaaS? It boils down to how you treat your customers. Applying best practices for SaaS customer success is key to early-stage SaaS wins.
According to Forrester Research, nearly 3 out of every 4 businesses believe improving the customer experience should be the first priority. That’s great news if you’re a new SaaS founder!
It gives you the opportunity to outwork your competition through stellar customer success. The attention you give your first one hundred customers can be the catalyst for your early success as a SaaS.
That’s why I created the SaaS Camp, which puts an emphasis on nailing customer success with your first hundred customers. Read on to discover the top five best practices for SaaS customer success in 2022. Let’s dive in!
According to Forrester Research, nearly 3 out of every 4 businesses believe improving the customer experience should be the first priority. That’s great news if you’re a new SaaS founder!
It gives you the opportunity to outwork your competition through stellar customer success. The attention you give your first one hundred customers can be the catalyst for your early success as a SaaS.
That’s why I created the SaaS Camp, which puts an emphasis on nailing customer success with your first hundred customers. Read on to discover the top five best practices for SaaS customer success in 2022. Let’s dive in!
What Is SaaS Customer Success?
SaaS customer success is the act of helping your customers achieve their short and long-term goals with your SaaS product.
It starts by developing a rapport with your customer through onboarding, where your customer can ask questions, learn the ins and outs of the product, and understand how to tailor it to best meet their specific needs.
Done well, customer success is an extension of your product where you offer ongoing support to meet the needs of your customer to ensure success with your SaaS product. The result is a customer who values your SaaS product at every phase of the customer journey.
Early-stage SaaS founders can have tremendous success by enlisting the help of a coach to decrease their learning curve, improve systems and processes, and see the bigger picture.
It starts by developing a rapport with your customer through onboarding, where your customer can ask questions, learn the ins and outs of the product, and understand how to tailor it to best meet their specific needs.
Done well, customer success is an extension of your product where you offer ongoing support to meet the needs of your customer to ensure success with your SaaS product. The result is a customer who values your SaaS product at every phase of the customer journey.
Early-stage SaaS founders can have tremendous success by enlisting the help of a coach to decrease their learning curve, improve systems and processes, and see the bigger picture.
Customer Success vs. Customer Support/Account Management
It’s common for Saas founders to confuse the difference between customer success and customer support. In reality, they’re very different animals. To help you build clarity, I’ll briefly describe the differences here.
Another way to think about it is while customer support may solve similar issues every day, customer success will solve problems tailored to each specific customer and their goals with the SaaS product. Each service professional empathizes with the customer to politely solve their problems, but they do it in functionally different ways.
- Customer Success is all about the long-term objectives and goals of your customer. It’s about taking proactive steps to ensure user success throughout the lifetime of the customer journey. The key metrics for customer success are customer retention and lifetime value.
- Customer Support focuses on solving specific problems in real time. It’s transactional in nature and focuses on making the customer happy in the present versus over the long term. Key performance metrics involve customer satisfaction and quality of service.
Another way to think about it is while customer support may solve similar issues every day, customer success will solve problems tailored to each specific customer and their goals with the SaaS product. Each service professional empathizes with the customer to politely solve their problems, but they do it in functionally different ways.
Why Customer Success Is So Important for Early-Stage SaaS Businesses
Due to the SaaS model, where users pay monthly or quarterly, it’s easy for customers to assess the cost-benefit of the tool in real-time. This can be good or bad news depending on how you look at it.
If your goal is to continually get signups, but you don’t care about your churn rate, well, maybe you can live with customers leaving for other products in your niche. Personally, I don’t recommend that.
However, if you’re looking to create a sustainable business that’s focused on retaining your customers and making them happy — customer success should be the heart of your SaaS business.
It goes without saying that without a solid plan to retain your SaaS customers, you run the risk of losing them, and quickly at that! In order to stand out, you must provide quality service that helps advance your customer’s business. Here are three reasons why customer success is crucial for early-stage SaaS businesses:
If your goal is to continually get signups, but you don’t care about your churn rate, well, maybe you can live with customers leaving for other products in your niche. Personally, I don’t recommend that.
However, if you’re looking to create a sustainable business that’s focused on retaining your customers and making them happy — customer success should be the heart of your SaaS business.
It goes without saying that without a solid plan to retain your SaaS customers, you run the risk of losing them, and quickly at that! In order to stand out, you must provide quality service that helps advance your customer’s business. Here are three reasons why customer success is crucial for early-stage SaaS businesses:
1. Prioritizes Customer Relationships
The goal of any early-stage SaaS should be to make its customers happy. When you dedicate your business to customer success principles, you prioritize not only your success, but also your customer’s success as well.
By proactively focusing on how to best meet your customer’s needs and helping them achieve their goals, you create strong business relationships that go beyond transactional service to brand loyalty.
By proactively focusing on how to best meet your customer’s needs and helping them achieve their goals, you create strong business relationships that go beyond transactional service to brand loyalty.
2. Strengthens Customer Loyalty
Customer success done well goes hand and hand with customer loyalty. Think about it! If you have a product where you continuously receive support on how to best use it. tailored to your specific needs, why go anywhere else?
It makes sense, doesn’t it? When you value customer success and the customer journey, you build a strong bond that feels more like a partnership rather than a service. That’s what you want!
It makes sense, doesn’t it? When you value customer success and the customer journey, you build a strong bond that feels more like a partnership rather than a service. That’s what you want!
3. Increases the Value of Your Product
What’s the difference between a business and a brand? Price. Brands can charge more because customers know the experience they’re going to get. They believe in that experience, and they’re proud to represent the brand.
Through your customer success efforts, your customers will begin to realize what your company stands for and appreciate it. As they become more loyal to your product, they’ll believe they are getting a deal, and when prices rise, they’ll happily pay.
While value isn’t price, price certainly has value. Whether your customers are willing to pay depends on the value of your brand.
If you're tired of continually putting in maximum effort, but not seeing anything in return, I can help. At SaaS Camp, I promise to increase your SaaS revenue by 3X in under 3 months, without paid advertising.
Through your customer success efforts, your customers will begin to realize what your company stands for and appreciate it. As they become more loyal to your product, they’ll believe they are getting a deal, and when prices rise, they’ll happily pay.
While value isn’t price, price certainly has value. Whether your customers are willing to pay depends on the value of your brand.
If you're tired of continually putting in maximum effort, but not seeing anything in return, I can help. At SaaS Camp, I promise to increase your SaaS revenue by 3X in under 3 months, without paid advertising.
SaaS Customer Success: Best Practices
Customer success can dramatically transform your early-stage SaaS and significantly reduce your churn rate. By following best practices in your customer success, you can retain your most valuable customers.
Here are my top five customer success best practices for 2022:
Here are my top five customer success best practices for 2022:
1. Prioritize Customer Success From the Beginning
The easiest way to stand out as an early-stage SaaS company is to offer impeccable service. What better way to separate yourself from the pack than with customer success!
Believe it or not, only one in four B2B SaaS businesses make customer success a priority for their clients.
One great example of a SaaS company that supports customer success from the very beginning is Chargify.
Believe it or not, only one in four B2B SaaS businesses make customer success a priority for their clients.
One great example of a SaaS company that supports customer success from the very beginning is Chargify.
They have loads of customer stories showcasing how their product has helped their business become more successful. That doesn’t happen without the right customer success plan from the very beginning.
By becoming an early adopter of customer success, you’ll stand out from the businesses learning the hard way.
By becoming an early adopter of customer success, you’ll stand out from the businesses learning the hard way.
2. Continuously Collect Customer Insights
Like everything else, it’s important to track your customer success metrics to see if they’re working. If not, what’s the point?
Here are some ways you can determine the effectiveness of your customer success efforts:
There are loads of tools on the market that can help you do this, but here are a couple that I like:
By continuously collecting customer insights, you’ll be able to best determine what’s working and what isn’t, and double down on the things that resonate most with your customers.
Here are some ways you can determine the effectiveness of your customer success efforts:
- Use surveys, social media, and host customer events
- Develop a useful process to collect, share, and implement customer feedback
There are loads of tools on the market that can help you do this, but here are a couple that I like:
By continuously collecting customer insights, you’ll be able to best determine what’s working and what isn’t, and double down on the things that resonate most with your customers.
3. Develop a Smooth Onboarding Process For Your Customers
The easiest way to follow up with your customers and reduce your churn rate is to create systems and processes around onboarding your customers.
HubSpot has an excellent SaaS onboarding process that’s tailored to meet your specific needs. Whether you’re looking to use HubSpot’s platform to capture more leads, automate your sales process, or organize and track your customer communications, they’ve got you covered.
HubSpot has an excellent SaaS onboarding process that’s tailored to meet your specific needs. Whether you’re looking to use HubSpot’s platform to capture more leads, automate your sales process, or organize and track your customer communications, they’ve got you covered.
HubSpot’s attention to detail demonstrates their willingness to customize their SaaS product for customer success and help each client reach their goals.
Dedicating your efforts to customer success helps you support your customers at each phase of their journey and strengthens the business relationship.
Here are two tools we recommend:
At SaaS Camp, I’m all about the power of systems and processes. That’s why when you join, you’ll learn the best strategies for onboarding your newest clients. I guarantee that you can multiply your revenue for your B2B SaaS in 3 months or less, without paid ads.
Dedicating your efforts to customer success helps you support your customers at each phase of their journey and strengthens the business relationship.
Here are two tools we recommend:
At SaaS Camp, I’m all about the power of systems and processes. That’s why when you join, you’ll learn the best strategies for onboarding your newest clients. I guarantee that you can multiply your revenue for your B2B SaaS in 3 months or less, without paid ads.
4. Don’t Neglect Customers That Are Offboarding
It can be easy sometimes to coast after you’ve had some wins. I get it! However, it’s important to always keep customer success top of mind and never neglect customers that are offboarding.
It’s an excellent time to receive feedback from your customers that aren’t renewing your service. That valuable information can be used to reduce your churn rate in the future and save you a TON of money.
Don’t be shy about asking for feedback about how you can improve the user experience when customers decide not to renew their subscriptions.
It’s an excellent time to receive feedback from your customers that aren’t renewing your service. That valuable information can be used to reduce your churn rate in the future and save you a TON of money.
Don’t be shy about asking for feedback about how you can improve the user experience when customers decide not to renew their subscriptions.
5. Stay on Top of Your Customer Data
With all the data resources available today, it’s easier than ever to stay on top of your customer success data. However, based on some research, my top three choices for resources to keep on top of your customer success data are:
These tools offer the capacity to keep up with your customer success data and analyze your key performance indicators.
These tools offer the capacity to keep up with your customer success data and analyze your key performance indicators.
Establish Your Value With a Solid Customer Success Plan
Every great business starts with a solid plan. Your customer success plan is paramount to your success as an early-stage SaaS company.
At SaaS Camp, I regularly help early-stage SaaS businesses increase their revenue by 3X in less than 3 months without using paid ads.
If you’re looking for guidance to cut down on your learning curve, increase your profits, and build a successful SaaS, I can help. Have a look at some of my resources to see how I can help you grow your revenue and build a successful SaaS empire.
At SaaS Camp, I regularly help early-stage SaaS businesses increase their revenue by 3X in less than 3 months without using paid ads.
If you’re looking for guidance to cut down on your learning curve, increase your profits, and build a successful SaaS, I can help. Have a look at some of my resources to see how I can help you grow your revenue and build a successful SaaS empire.
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