A Customer Success eBook

THE9 TENETSOF SAASCUSTOMERENGAGEMENTMARKETING

Customer Successcan directly controlsome, but not all thelevers that lead tohappy customers andlow churn rates.

C U S T O M E R S U C C E S SI N F L U E N C E S

Target Customer

AcquisitionFree Trial Pipeline

Onboarding

Engagement

Adoption

Customer Feedback

Renewal

Expansion

C U S T O M E R S U C C E S SD I R E C T LY C O N T R O L S

But Customer EngagementMarketing is right in theCustomer SuccessWheelhouse

Engagement

But First,What isCustomerEngagementMarketing?

IS:-New feature announcements-Product tutorials-Industry best practices-Industry thought leadership

NOT:-Detailed feature announcements-Help desk content-Onboarding content

The people havespoken!Customer Successshould drive.

In a recent discussion on the LinkedIn

Customer Success Forum group, virtually

every respondent stated that Customer

Success should drive the customer

engagement strategy, while marketing

should “own” the execution.

Pat KellyVP Customer Success, Brainshark

“We have established a CustomerCommunication team…It is a partnershipbetween Customer Success and CustomerMarketing …The marketing part of thegroup executes on the emailcommunications that often are "from"the CSM assigned to the customer.”

Todd OaksVP Customer Success, SceneDoc

“Customer Success owns the customerrelationship strategy and is a direct reportto the CEO. Marketing provides input intothe strategy and is responsible for theexecution based upon agreed uponinitiatives and tactics.”

Karen SunPrincipal, KS Consulting

“It's important to have one single controlpoint for the execution of all customercommunications to avoid spammingcustomers and to have consistentmessaging. This usually resides inMarketing.”

6Tips to Setyour Companyup for CustomerEngagementMarketingSuccess

1No

Launch aCustomer Blog

Duplicate your company’s blog and give it a

light rebrand as a customer blog. Start publishing

posts at a steady cadence – perhaps 2-4 per month.

Encourage customers to subscribe during the

onboarding process.

2No

Don’t Be Boring

Content is a demand generation marketer’s most

effective instrument for building trust with

prospects. They create eBooks, Infographics and

Presentations that have a light, aspirational tone

and are highly visual.

Customer marketers sometimes fail to engage

their audience because they focus on detailed

feature news and screenshots. Steal a page from

demand generation marketing to keep your

customer content interesting!

3No

Send MonthlyEmails

If you’re starting from scratch, pull together a

monthly email that contains 3 things:

1. Highlight your top product feature releases

2. A customer story discussing how they effectively use your product

3. Reuse the best performing content piece your demand generation team

4No

Segment byPersona

“Customer” is not a segment. “Executive in

North America, Pro subscriber for over 90 days,

11-50 employees, actively engages with our

content”. Now that’s a segment!

True, more segments mean more content and

effort – start small and grow your segmentation

strategy as your resources (and customer base)

expand.

5No

InitiateLifecycleMarketing

As your customers move from Trial, to

Onboarding, to their first 90 days of usage and

beyond they should receive content tailored to

their lifecycle stage as they climb the learning

curve. Keep these stages in mind as you grow

your content library.

When you’re ready, deploy the content using a

marketing automation platform like Hubspot or

Marketo so the right content is served to

customers when it is most relevant to them.

6No

EncourageProduct Usage

You’re a master customer marketer! Time to coax

users down the path to success. Monitor how your

customers use of your product. Serve content that

matches new (or existing) features they have not

yet explored in depth. Bonus points if you can

automate this process.