Your Closing Problem Might be a Discovery Problem

Have you found yourself frustrated by deals that seem promising but somehow never reach the finish line? It might be tempting to attribute this to a problem with your closing techniques, but what if I told you that the issue usually lies much earlier in the sales process? In my years of direct sales experience as well as conducting many pipeline and opportunity reviews for clients, I've noticed a recurring pattern: deals get stuck in limbo because they were never properly qualified as opportunities to begin with. This discovery problem isn't exclusive to new business sales; it affects expansion sales…

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May 3, 2024

Customer Success / Metrics

6 Steps to Bottoms Up Capacity Planning for Customer Success

A common question that I get asked is how to conduct capacity planning for Customer Success Managers. It’s a great question to be asking and something that all CS leaders should be thinking about. I also almost always get asked a follow-up question on this topic: “I’m told that an industry best practice is that each CSM should be managing $2 million in ARR. Is this a good rule to follow?" I’m glad to be asked about this, and I will share my thoughts (based on my experience) a little further in this post. First, I am going to share…

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April 3, 2024

Metrics / Sales

7 Steps on How to Use Win/Loss Analysis to Improve Performance

Knowing why you won and why you lost is one thing but understanding how to apply this knowledge is what will ultimately allow you to make decisions that will enable positive change. The ultimate question we need to answer is how will the learnings from a win/loss analysis help you adapt, sell and engage more effectively so you can win more and lose less. Once you’ve completed your analysis as discussed in this previous blog post it’s time to get tactical and put a plan in place on how you can adjust your execution to help you sell differently and…

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February 28, 2024

Metrics / Sales

Learning to Adapt with Win/Loss Analysis

In every market and economic environment, there are winners and losers. In the past year there have been a disproportionate number of companies losing due to the macroeconomic changes. That said, losing does not have to be a foregone conclusion. By adapting your go-to-market strategy & tactics, organizations can avoid leaving money on the table whether we’re operating in good times or hard times. There is a big risk to not adapting your approach. Following the same playbook and tactics that you relied on over the previous 12 to 24 months can have large pitfalls when there are changes in…

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February 22, 2024

Churn / Customer Success / Metrics

7 Steps your Churn Analysis Might Be Missing

In the past year, have you wondered why your churn analysis is inaccurate when, once upon a time (pre-2023/24), your churn analysis was pretty reliable? If so, you aren't alone. Misguided and inaccurate churn analysis has contributed to businesses' overall challenge in forecasting accurate revenue numbers. Often, a churn analysis consists of a basic analysis based on historical churn data, which would then be extrapolated to get forecasted churn results. In 2021 and 2022, this may have been sufficient, but with so many changes in the economy and SaaS industry, this approach is showing its flaws. When you do a…

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February 20, 2024

Thank you!