As SaaStr readers know, I think people put a little too much into sales, and not quite enough into customer success, especially as they hit first Traction. It’s natural. It’s the hunt. The hunt is the new logo, the new game, the new deal. Once you close them — well, hey, your product is so great, of course it’ll all go so well 
But the thing is, you get 5/6ths of your SaaS revenue from your customers AFTER you close the deal, AFTER the first contract … and that’s all customer / client success my friend …
If you haven’t “done” customer success before yourself … if you don’t know how to manage and engage customers over the long term … learn. It’s an art and a science. Don’t wing it.
There’s a lot of ways to learn Client Success … but I’ve got to say, this conference on May 30 in San Francisco has a killer list of speakers on client success, and I don’t know where else you’d connect with so many of them. I’m up on stage (I think) with our VP of Client Success who’s speaking.
It’s not free, but I’d spend a few bucks if you want to learn about Client Success. Where else you gonna get this horsepower?
Trust me, if you don’t know client success yourself — just learning from Bill Binch at Marketo (just IPO’d, up 67%); Kathy Lord at Intacct; and Eitan Saban from Adobe EchoSign alone is worth the $195-$295. All three are geniuses here. I don’t know everyone on the list, but man, it’s solid. [There are some decent CEOs and VCs on the list, too, but you can see them anywhere ]
More here: http://customersuccess.eventbrite.com/ and http://www.customersuccess.org/
Go. If I’m wrong and it’s not worth it, I’ll buy you lunch or a drink or three to make it up to you.
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Over 200 executives from industry leading organizations will share best practices on developing a customer-centric culture across the entire organization, and how their companies are organizing, planning, staffing, training, analyzing, cost justifying and automating Customer Success efforts.
Announced Speakers:
- Geoffrey Moore, Author of Crossing the Chasm
- Aaron Levie, CEO at Box
- Dan Steinman, Chief Customer Officer at Gainsight
- Bernie Kassar, VP Customer Success at Xactly
- Kathy Lord, VP Sales and Customer Success at Intaact
- Tien Tzuo, CEO at Zuora
- Lori Wright, VP eCommerce Retention at Symantec
- Roger Lee, Partner at Battery Ventures
- Chris Cabrera, CEO at Xactly
- Nick Mehta, CEO at Gainsight
- Aaref Hilaly, Partner at Sequoia Capital
- Dr. Fred Van Bennekom, Customer Feedback Architect
- Byron Deeter, Partner at Bessemer Venture Partners
- Kia Puhm, VP Customer Success at Oracle Eloqua
- Neeracha Taychakhoonavudh, SVP Distribution Chief of Staff at Salesforce.com
- Bill Binch, SVP Sales at Marketo
- Abhay Rajaram, VP Customer Success at YouSendIt
- Amanda Schmidt, Senior Director of Customer Success at Marketo
- Jon Herstein, VP Customer Success at Box
- Eitan Saban, VP Head of Client Success at Adobe Echosign
- Mikael Blaisdell, Customer Relationship Architect
- Ping Li, General Partner at Accel Partners
- Greg Higham, CIO at Marketo
- Laura Lederman, Principal at William Blair
- Anjanette Hill-Mendoza, Director, Customer Engagement at YouSendIt
- Jeff Kaplan, Managing Director at THINKstrategies
- Lincoln Murphy, Principal at Sixteen Ventures
- Mike Rutz, VP of Sales at Angie’s List
- Bruce Felt, Former CFO at SuccessFactors
- Bryan Plaster, Director of Customer Success at Informatica Cloud
- Chad Horenfeld, Director of Customer Operations at Influitive
- Chris Stewart, AVP, Global Client Success Services at Cornerstone OnDemand
- Catherine Blackmore, VP Account Management at Badgeville
We hope that you’ll join us on Thursday, May 30th at the Four Seasons Hotel in San Francisco, California from 9:00 AM to 6:30 PM and help define the future of this developing industry.
(Cross-posted @ saastr)
