Are you the first CSM at your startup? Congratulations! You have so much opportunity and responsibility to grow the company.
These are the first five things you should do as a new CSM at a startup
- Contact your customers and let them know a little about yourself immediately
- Learn the business relationship history of your customers with your startup
- Write down all the gaps you see in terms of process, do not initiate anything until you have a grasp of everything
- Contact your customers through light touch
- Try to make sense of the chaos
Contact your customers and let them know a little about yourself immediately
It is way too early in your relationship with your customers to start scheduling business reviews. Let them know a little bit about yourself and your experience. Make sure to let them know you are there for absolutely any questions, all they need to do is reach out.
Learn the business relationship history of your customers with your startup
It is crucial to understand the history of your customers with your startup. If they are really upset with expectations not being met they will ignore you. You need to be aware of that to adjust your communications with them.
Write down all the gaps you see in terms of process, do not initiate anything until you have a grasp of everything
There are going to be a ton of gaps in customer success process. There might not even be a process. Write what you see is missing and after a month put it all together. This will start helping you build a formal way of doing Customer Success.
Contact your customers through light touch
As I mentioned before, do not start your CSM journey by immediately scheduling business reviews at the executive level. Start letting the customer know that you are there to help them. There are many ways to do this. My favorite is through snapshots of the software, insights they may be looking for, and product update emails.
Try to make sense of the chaos
You will be flustered by how much is going on. Do not worry, things are supposed to break at early stage technology companies. Embrace that things are going to be hectic for a while. This steady emotional state when stakes are high will make you a trusted adviser.
Startup Customer Success 