The profession and practices of Customer Success continue to evolve as an ever wider range of companies set up their own teams worldwide. The role that was once primarily found in the SaaS/Cloud B2B sector has expanded far beyond to any company whose business model depends upon customer relationship retention and expansion.
The first formal research into what subscription-model companies were doing organizationally about customer retention was begun in 2009. A follow up series of research surveys was opened in 2010 and 2011. In late 2012, the first specific inquiry on The State of the Customer Success Profession was conducted via an extensive online survey and follow-up interviews.
More focused research was done in 2014 and thereafter on how companies were defining their customer success strategies and efforts, the process/workflow of their CS teams and on the state of their Customer Success Technology Suites. Survey and interview research continued yearly, with findings reported at the various Customer SuccessCon events in the San Francisco area, Seattle, Denver, Boston and London UK each year through 2019.
The Covid pandemic halted the SuccessCon events, and there was a growing realization that surveys were not producing the quality data that was needed. Because we required participants to identify themselves and their companies, and we often had multiple respondents from the same company to use in comparing answers, we found that these responses often contained contradictory claims. As a result, the primary method for the continuing research became direct interviews and review of published content.
The issues that we continue to research include:
- How companies are aligning their Customer Success and Customer Support teams.
- How the potential of the Customer Success ecosystem of technology vendors, consultants, trainers, and fractional service providers can be utilized to do more with more.
- The continued development of the CS technology sector, now with over 400 vendors.
- The practical usage of ai in Customer Success.
- The exploration of Customer Realized Value, including required technology and reporting to drive outcome led growth.
Reports of our findings will be published in Customer Success Central articles, Customer Success Library resources, in conversations in The Customer Success Forum on LinkedIn, and directly via Office Hours sessions with interested parties. If you have questions, or wish to discuss a particular research project, please use the Contact Us form here.
