People may not understand the use of “combat,” but we are in a precarious situation and time where many companies are fighting for their business life. In 2019, there were many thought leaders and evidence that the economy was shifting to the customer. With an inundation of products and services as subscriptions to choose from, the customer could quickly leave your company and take their business with them. That was central to the argument for the necessity of customer success.
In the current economic downturn, we have found that it is still a customer economy. Customers not only reign, but churn is highly feared. And churn prevention has turned into a battle for customers.
What Customers Want
Perhaps one of the hardest things for companies to predict is which customers are going to churn. You must be proactive in your collection and analysis of customer data. But data does not stand alone. There is the encouragement of adoption and use of the product while establishing a relationship with customers. One advised step is to facilitate these three motions to identify why a customer is using your product or service in the first place. According to Nick Mehta and Allison Picken’s book, The Customer Success Economy, business leaders realize that customer expectations are changing. “No longer do customers want a “product” or “service”—they want their problem to be solved.”
Factor in the current economic climate and that companies are doing more with less; businesses are looking at software services and platforms that solve their problems. They want a one-stop-shop. Rather than various software with a singular function, companies are increasingly seeking multiple functions from a single product or platform. If you cannot provide a product and service that solves customer’s problems and delivers value, they will undoubtedly churn. Why? Unless you provide a niche solution, the market has many products that can replace you.
How do you solve this problem? Gainsight CS. CS is a super-powered decision engine. It can calculate broad specifications in real-time. Its fast processing can show an engagement entirely in the flow of the user’s experience—with no lag. Because CS has a fully integrated analytics tool within its platform, it has a built-in knowledge base. Users can stay in the product and not navigate away for additional information or answers.
Users value the efficiency of the “one-stop-shop” experience. It creates a streamlined, personalized experience within the product. Their time-to-value happens not in months but in minutes. When it comes to optimizing opportunities for risk mitigation, this is the ideal product.
Negative Retention
Let’s start with a simple and obvious definition: churn is the opposite of retention. It is based on an established relationship where the customer uses your product or service to accomplish their business outcomes and goals. But this is not merely a relationship that starts with a handshake. It is one where they are using your product regularly, you are encouraging them to do so, and you know exactly how and when customers use it. That is the most valuable data you can have on customers.
Our C360 is the information center of CS. It contains all your customer’s synthesized data, providing you with a holistic view of them. C360 creates efficiency and standardization by providing a single source of truth accessible to everyone in your organization. By allowing multiple flexible layouts, it will enable you to tailor based on customer or user characteristics. C360 integrates with all other Gainsight features, such as PX, CX, and RO, providing a comprehensive ability to manage your customers. It points directly to particular customers when analyzing retention and churn. And everyone knows that health is crucial to your customer, customer base, and your company’s value.
Being Proactive
If you think of churn as negative retention, it enables you to see what is preventing retention. For instance, if your customer is not responded to or feels your response is inadequate when you respond, you can identify “time” as the factor contributing to churn. The antidote would be to identify the rising risk. But before risk can arise, why not be proactive? Without the right information at the right time, your teams become reactive and not proactive. That is a retention killer! CS Scorecard can leverage a flexible framework with multiple health scorecard models. By measure both objective and subjective inputs CSMs and teams can make accurate health assessments with necessary and calculated weight measures. It gives detailed health insights allowing you to understand health trends.
A Path Away from Churn and Towards Success
Every customer should be placed on a path of success within their journey. While there is a lifecycle to every customer, their journey can be particular to them due to their needs and goals. In Gainsight, you can design and build a coordinated customer into Journey Orchestrator, our CX feature, that incorporates the customer’s goals and drives their outcomes. It also allows you to include human and digital touchpoints improving the customer’s experience. It is seamless, giving the customer a feeling of assurance with their engagement.
Timeline is another CS feature that helps develop a cadence of contact. A concrete way to eradicate retention is the lack of connection. Without frequent enough conversations, no matter the format, customers feel isolated and unheard. Two to three strategic conversations a year may not be enough. You want to build trust with the customer, and this feature can be a motivator.
Being aware of the cost per CSM, automation assists this situation. Timeline is a centralized location where team members can capture every nuance and detail of conversations with customers. Since it is a timeline, you can study the customer’s history and contact with your company, discussion topics, and requests. You can search, report, and automatically log emails and notify teammates when help is needed. Automation and in-app messages can also aid in keeping contact with the customer on a programmed cadence.
Actionable data
The connection between churn and revenue is enough to make any company proactive about engaging customers at risk of churning. Data that raise the visibility of these risks are worth the investment—no matter the form. One Gainsight friend shared that they celebrate the discovery of risk by rewarding and “calling out” the individual. The mindset of customer success is part detective, an innate curiosity of anything that may cause churn. When they find it, they are promoting retention by connecting questions and answers to the right customers.
With Gainsight CS, much of the detective work is done but what is needed is your response. With our Reporting and Dashboards, you can make proactive and better decisions with customer insights. The data can be filtered and raked, surfacing the correct information at the right time, creating Calls to Action (CTAs). Combine the customizable Dashboard with our Playbooks, and you have retention acceleration! Playbooks provide prescriptive actions for each customer and segment. By following step by step instructions, you can prioritize workflows to the customers that need them most and deliver a superior experience.
When creating a churn model and solving for risk, technology should have a significant place in that motion. It should analyze as much data as you can capture to expose risk, prevent churn, and positively impact success. Gainsight CS is the ultimate powerhouse provider to streamline your churn prevention and elevate your retention. Take a personalized tour today to learn more and empower your fight against churn.
