Organizing for
Customer Success
September
2013

New Business Models are Demanding Companies
Focus on Customer Success
Per-User Per-Cycle Per-Transaction

Customer Success is a New Function in Most
Companies
• More Customer-Focused Than Sales
• More Proactive Than Support
• Not Many People Experienced in Field

Companies are Looking for Advice on How to
Structure Their CSM Organization
• Where Should Customer Success Report?
• How Does Customer Success Fit with Sales and Services?
• How Does Customer Success Align to Other Functions?

The Five Org Models of Customer Success
1. Firefighter CSM
2. Sales-Oriented CSM
3. Service-Oriented CSM
4. Integrated CSM
5. Partnership CSM

Firefighter CSMs
Common In Companies With:
Early-stage companies
CSM does support, renewals, etc.
Pros:
CSM is “one stop shop”
CSM ensures great client experience
Cons:
Hard to scale with so many hats
Difficult to hire for role
CEO
Sales Services
Customer
Success
Management

Sales-Oriented
CSMs
CEO
Sales
CSM / Renewals
/ Account
Management
Services
Common In Companies With:
Low level of product complexity
Competitive sales/renewals
Pros:
CSM aligned to revenue
Also aligned to up-sell
Cons:
Less customer focus
Perceived as “another salesperson”

Service-
Oriented CSMs
CEO
Sales Services
Customer
Success
Management
Professional
Services
Training Onboarding Support
Common In Companies With:
Medium level of product complexity
More mature organization
Pros:
CSM aligned to customer needs
CSM also aligned to rest of service org
Cons:
Less revenue alignment / quantification
Lots of touch points for client

Integrated
CSM
CEO
New Business
Sales
Chief
Customer
Officer
Renewals /
Account
Management
Customer
Success
Management
Professional
Services
Training Onboarding Support
Common In Companies With:
Moderate level of product complexity
Expansion opportunity
Pros:
CCO “owns” existing customers
Sales team are pure hunters
Cons:
Requires versatile CCO
Depends on mature organization

Partnership
CSM
CEO
Sales
Renewals /
Account
Management
Services
Customer
Success
Management
Professional
Services
Training Onboarding Support
Common In Companies With:
High level of product complexity
Competitive sales/renewals
Pros:
CSM can be very customer-focused
Renewals aligned with sales motion
Cons:
Some level of duplication / overlap
Sometimes hard to quantify ROI

Where Do You
Fit?
Business Maturity
ProductComplexity
Firefighter
Sales-
Oriented
Service-
Oriented
Integrated
Model
Partnership
Model

Other
Considerations
Issue Best Practices
Up-Sell Lives in Sales unless CSM owns all customer revenue
If in Sales, incent CSM team for leads / opportunities created
Retention / Customer
Marketing
Lives in Marketing but assign dedicated resource focused on existing
customer marketing as part of virtual team
Titles Customer Success Manager trending as Account Manager often has
connotation of Sales

Thank You!
A Complete Customer Success Platform
www.gainsight.com