• Another shift the pandemic has accelerated – enterprise sales

    B2B selling was already changing before COVID-19. I’ve written before about how I think customer success practices with their emphasis on product usage is changing sales to be more data and impact driven and more receptive to the user, not just the purchasing unit. This change is not unique to enterprise software sales – think…


  • Update on As a Service Trends

    Here is list of recent announcements and posts in the As a Service trend which I am curating in a magazine on Flipboard. Here they are (20 of the most recent) after the jump, in a convenient list of RSS fed posts 💥


  • Customer Success is not about tech or human touch but about the right touch

    By touch I mean the way and frequency of times a customer is touched by representatives of a company, whether by technology (think BOTS, automations, etc.) or a human. I would also argue for less touch as there is a danger of bureaucracy creeping in to this fledgling profession, which comes on top of customer…


  • The new customer success partnerships

    Customer Success teams in SaaS companies (mostly what I am focusing on here) probably like to think they are the spearhead for making customers successful (as the name suggests). In truth, its not that simple (is it ever). First a little context on the two DanelDoodle’s I shared in this post. I use the Paper…


  • Metrics that matter in Customer Success

    I had an interesting conversation on LinkedIn the other day. It was based on a retrospective view of the customer success profession which I had written about on the State of Customer Success in 2018 after attending a conference. I captured the essence of the conversation in a DanelDoodle and discuss briefly here.


  • Two brains on “Everything as a Service” for the price of one

    These are some thoughts captured and co-written by Stephen Danelutti and Jason Noble, two long time contributors to the world of Everything As a Service (XaaS) who met recently. We realised our common background and insights and decided to produce this combined thought piece – hope you enjoy.


  • As a Service trend research – customer solutions

    This is a topic I will be covering as a chapter in my As a Service trend report. It’s not entirely dissimilar to one of the other chapter topics I will be covering and have written about here: As a Service trend research – products to services.


  • As a Service trend research – products to services

    One of the chapters I am covering in a trend report I am working on (As a Service Trend) will explain how even tangible products can be open to “servicification” and purchased or subscribed to. For example, razors for personal grooming, cars for transport, fork lifts for logistics, etc.


  • Balance customer success at scale with high touch when new demand spikes

    I’m extremely lucky to work in a space that supports remote working, where demand is booming. COVID-19 has driven demand in the opposite direction for many, effecting their very existing. For the lucky few, it can also be something of a double edged sword. Supporting your customers the right way regardless, is crucial.


  • Cloudy with a chance of churn and how to retain your SaaS customers

    One of the first things a customer will question in a downturn, is where they can cut or reduce recurring payments or OPEX. They will look for any reason, rational or otherwise. Licensing commitments aside, if you are a SaaS business and have been doing your job well, they should find only reasons to stay.…


  • Corona as a catalyst for teamwork customer success and AI

    I wouldn’t be the first to jump on the Corona Virus bandwagon, if that’s what I was trying to. No, I’m simply observing the ways I see others doing so, with varying degrees of success, and for good and bad reasons. Mostly it’s a way to conflate the unintended impact it is having, or where…


  • Workplace collaboration has an outcomes challenge – get intentional to overcome it

    With the coronavirus, workplace collaboration is getting a big boost. Just check Zoom’s stock price in the last two months. Workplace collaboration is hardly new but it does have a slew of new angles, technology vendors, experts, etc. The ingredient often missing in all the hubbub (literally and in the market) are effective outcomes.


  • For citizen development to work address innovation culture first

    I’m seeing more and more signals driving this trend which has only been around a short while. Gartner describes citizen development thus. Its precursor was the consumerisation of IT. One of the key aspects of this trend was that decision making on the use of software in organisations was increasingly being taken by business users,…


  • 150 Million reasons the subscription economy is real

    Amazon.com recently announced financial results for its fourth quarter ended December 31, 2019 – Source: The Information. Amongst all the announcements is the staggering figure referred to in the title, in relation to Prime membership. From the announcement: