Why Customer Success is not Customer Support?
Customer Success and Customer Support are both important functions within an organization, but they have distinct roles and objectives however these two terms are seen to be interchangeable in todays day and age. One of the prime examples are how jobs are posted on LinkedIn and how roles around support, client support and after sales support are incorrectly featured as Customer Success. Infact “Success” as a term has gathered a bit of traction where you even see HR roles being rebranded as People Success or Employee Success role. This article seeks to clarify the difference between Customer Success, a role pioneered by the advent of SaaS Models and Customer Support, a function that has been in existence for a long time now.
Focus
Customer Success: The primary focus of Customer Success is to proactively ensure the long-term success and satisfaction of customers. This involves understanding customers’ goals, helping them achieve their desired outcomes, and driving value from the product or service.
Customer Support: Customer Support focuses on addressing immediate customer issues and inquiries. The main objective is to provide timely assistance, resolve problems, and answer questions to ensure customer satisfaction in the short term.
Relationship
Customer Success: Customer Success teams aim to build strong, strategic relationships with customers. They act as trusted advisors, working closely with customers to understand their unique needs and challenges. They provide guidance, best practices, and support to help customers achieve their goals.
Customer Support: While Customer Support teams also interact with customers, their interactions are typically more transactional. They primarily handle specific issues or inquiries raised by customers, focusing on resolving the problem at hand rather than building long-term relationships.
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Proactive vs Reactive
Customer Success: Customer Success takes a proactive approach by identifying potential challenges before they become problems. They engage with customers to understand their needs, anticipate issues, and offer solutions, thereby minimizing the occurrence of problems and maximizing customer success.
Customer Support: Customer Support is reactive in nature. When customers reach out with a problem or question, Customer Support teams react by addressing the issue promptly. They focus on resolving individual incidents rather than proactively preventing them.
Scope of Engagement
Customer Success: Customer Success teams have a broad scope of engagement. They are involved throughout the customer lifecycle, starting from onboarding and adoption, through to expansion, retention, and advocacy. They ensure a positive overall customer experience and help customers achieve their desired outcomes.
Customer Support: Customer Support primarily deals with specific customer issues or inquiries. Their engagement is more focused on providing technical assistance, troubleshooting problems, and answering questions related to the product or service.
Time Frame
Customer Success: Customer Success takes a long-term perspective. Their goal is to foster ongoing customer success and satisfaction over an extended period. They focus on building lasting relationships and ensuring that customers continue to derive value from the product or service throughout their journey.
Customer Support: Customer Support operates with a shorter time frame. Their aim is to address immediate customer issues or inquiries efficiently and effectively. Their primary focus is on providing timely resolution and support to customers in the moment.
Metrics
Customer Success: Customer Success teams measure success based on various metrics such as customer retention, expansion of accounts, customer satisfaction scores (CSAT/NPS), product adoption rates, and customer health scores. These metrics reflect the overall success and satisfaction of customers.
Customer Support: Customer Support tracks metrics like response time, ticket resolution time, first-contact resolution rate, customer satisfaction with specific interactions, and the number of open and closed tickets. These metrics provide insights into the efficiency and effectiveness of the support process.
Outreach
Customer Success: Customer Success teams actively reach out to customers to provide guidance, support, and assistance. They initiate proactive engagements to ensure customers are on track, offer advice on best practices, share relevant resources, and identify opportunities for improvement or expansion.
Customer Support: Customer Support teams generally wait for customers to initiate contact when they have an issue or question. They are reactive and respond promptly when customers reach out for assistance, focusing on resolving the specific problem or inquiry.
Strategic Alignment
Customer Success: Customer Success aligns its efforts with the customers’ business goals. They work closely with customers to understand their strategic objectives and align the usage of the product or service accordingly. They provide insights, recommendations, and strategies to help customers achieve their desired outcomes.
Customer Support: While Customer Support aims to address customer issues and inquiries, their focus is primarily on resolving individual problems rather than aligning with broader business objectives. Their goal is to ensure customers can use the product or service effectively without necessarily guiding them towards specific business outcomes
Skill Sets
Customer Success: Customer Success professionals possess a blend of business acumen, relationship-building skills, consultative abilities, and industry knowledge. They understand customers’ industries and business challenges, enabling them to provide tailored guidance and strategic advice to drive customer success.
Customer Support: Customer Support professionals typically have strong technical expertise and problem-solving skills. They possess in-depth knowledge of the product or service, troubleshooting techniques, and tools to address customer issues effectively. Their focus is on providing technical support and resolving specific customer inquiries.
Revenue Impact
Customer Success: Customer Success plays a role in revenue generation by ensuring customer satisfaction, retention, and expansion. They identify opportunities for upselling or cross-selling based on the customers’ evolving needs, and work towards maximizing the lifetime value of the customer by helping them achieve their desired outcomes.
Customer Support: While Customer Support indirectly contributes to revenue generation by ensuring customer satisfaction, their primary focus is on issue resolution. They help customers overcome technical challenges and provide support to ensure customers can use the product or service effectively, but their primary goal is not to actively drive revenue expansion.