In our earlier post, we established the vital role of Customer Success Managers (CSMs) in driving the ongoing growth of any business. CSMs bear the responsibility of ensuring a customer's success throughout their entire lifecycle, directly contributing to the overall growth of the company.
 

CSMs dedicate a significant portion of their time, typically around 60-75%, to engaging with customers. These interactions occur through various channels such as emails, chats, calls, and face-to-face meetings. Each conversation plays a crucial role in understanding the client's business, goals, preferences, and both short-term and long-term objectives. Consequently, many of these interactions are recorded and managed using customer success or CRM tools.
 

While businesses have been utilizing CRM tools for some time, the demand for dedicated CSM tools has grown in recent years. Just like the field of Customer Success itself, CS tools are relatively new, hence the need for them is still in doubt. You can find a lot of articles about how these tools don’t help or how these tools can completely change your customer experience.

In this post, we are highlighting few basic steps you can take to establish the need of CS tools for your team

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Do you need a CS Tool?

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The primary goal of such tools is to enhance the efficiency of your Customer Success Managers (CSMs), increase consistency in their efforts and gain a deeper understanding of your customers' businesses, ultimately driving revenue growth. However, it's crucial to note that these tools are highly customizable and require configuration based on your specific customers and playbooks that work for you.

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To unlock the full potential of these tools, it is essential to invest time in understanding your customer interactions on an individual level. By engaging in one-on-one interactions, discovering your playbooks, and building a comprehensive database of customer interactions (including calls, chats, emails, NPS scores, and more), maintaining clean data in your CRM, you can optimize the use of these tools.

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By leveraging the power of a customer success tool and combining it with personalized insights gained through direct interactions and a robust customer interaction database, you can achieve greater efficiency, improved customer understanding, and ultimately drive significant revenue growth for your business.

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Its difficult to say exactly when should you get a CS tool for your team but, here are 3 steps to follow which can ensure you are on the right path:

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First step

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The first step towards implementing a Customer Success (CS) tool is to acquire a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool and establish a secure and goal-oriented system for managing your customer data. A CRM is designed to store and maintain valuable customer information. It should enable seamless integration of email, chat, call recordings, and NPS tools, consolidating all data in a single location.

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A CRM tool offers numerous benefits, including robust reporting capabilities, intuitive dashboards for visual presentations, automation features at various levels, and enhanced efficiency and proactivity in customer interactions. However, it's important to acknowledge that the CRM implementation process requires commitment and effort.

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In a separate post, we will delve into the specifics of starting your CRM journey, providing guidance on how to kickstart and navigate this transformative process."

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Second step

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Before making the decision to invest in a Customer Success (CS) tool, it is crucial to establish your goals and understand why you want to acquire such a tool. What are your expectations, and can they be fulfilled through your existing CRM tool? If your CRM tool already meets your requirements, it's worth considering whether a new tool is truly necessary.

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Implementing a CS tool entails a significant investment, not only financially but also in terms of resources required to maintain the tool. Additionally, during the initial 6-12 months, your team will undergo a change management process. If this process is not executed properly, there is a risk of losing information and efficiency instead of gaining them.

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Therefore, it is essential to thoroughly assess your needs and answer these important questions before proceeding with the investment. Our team is available to assist you in this decision-making process and help you find the right answers.

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Finally,

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Now that your CRM is fully prepared with comprehensive customer information, dashboards, reports, and you have dedicated time to develop your playbooks, it's time to take the next logical step: choosing the right Customer Success (CS) tool for you.  You can choose from a wide range of CS tools to start with.  You can have multiple tools onboarded one by one or just one suite of tools that handles it all.  It depends on your number of customers, dollar value, interaction volume, product stage etc. But, before you can decide on which strategy works for you, it's ideal to take a few trials and understand the scope of these tools.

 

Also, While hearing positive feedback from peers about a particular tool is valuable, it is equally important to try it out and ensure that it aligns with your specific input and output requirements.

 

While most CS tools come with a Customer Success Manager (CSM) to assist you, it is advisable to have a resource within your organization to support you throughout the implementation process. Additionally, our team of experts can provide assistance and guide you through this selection and implementation phase with a stage wise strategy based on your unique requirements.