Practical CSM

Customer Success leaders need internal buy-in, not just customer buy-in.

A company-wide Customer Success mindset does not happen just because someone says “customers matter.”

Every team needs to understand what Customer Success means for them.

In this webinar clip, Rick Adams speaks with Krista Roberts about how CS leaders can build stronger internal buy-in.

Krista’s advice is simple:

Do internally what you already do with customers.
• Show the value
• Explain the why
• Make the ROI clear

Because every team is ultimately asking:

“What’s in it for me?”

For example:
• Sales can gain stronger referrals and customer proof
• Product gets better feedback and greater feature adoption
• Support gains insight into education gaps and proactive opportunities

But buy-in also requires boundaries.

Sales teams, for example, may worry that CS will interfere with account ownership, relationships, or commissions.

So CS leaders need to make two things clear:

What CS does.
And what CS does not do.

That clarity makes collaboration easier, safer, and more effective.

🎥 Watch the clip below.

Customers can feel when the whole company cares.

They can also feel when it doesn’t.

Customer Success is not only what happens in meetings with the CSM.

In this webinar clip, Rick Adams speaks with Christa Roberts about how a company-wide Customer Success mindset shapes the overall Customer Experience.

Customers notice:

• How quickly Support responds
• Whether Product listens to feedback
• Whether Billing shows flexibility
• Whether Sales, CS, Support, and Product are aligned
• Whether teams genuinely care about their outcomes

That’s why Customer Success and Customer Experience are so closely connected.

Rick explains the distinction simply:

Customer Experience is the journey.
Customer Success is the destination.

A customer can achieve their goal but have a painful journey.

Or have a great experience and still fail to achieve the outcome they came for.

The best companies deliver both: the right outcome and a joined-up, customer-focused experience along the way.

🎥 Watch the clip below.

Customer Success and Customer Experience are connected.
But they are not the same thing.

In this webinar clip, Rick Adams speaks with Christa Roberts about where Customer Success fits inside the wider Customer Experience.
Krista explains that Customer Experience is the full journey a person or company has with your organization.

That journey can start before they ever become a customer.

It may begin with:
• a marketing campaign
• a webinar
• a LinkedIn post
• a blog article
• a sales development conversation
• a demo
• a contract discussion

And it continues through implementation, onboarding, Customer Success, Support, Product, Billing, Finance, renewal, and beyond.
Customer Success is part of that journey.

But it is not the whole journey.

CS typically goes deeper in the post-sales and post-implementation phase, helping customers adopt, realize value, and achieve the outcomes they came for.

So one way to think about it is:
Customer Experience goes wider.
Customer Success goes deeper.

Both matter. But they are not interchangeable.

🎥 Watch the clip below.

Customer Success is everyone’s responsibility.

But that does not mean everyone is a CSM.

In this webinar clip, Rick Adams speaks with Christa Roberts about Customer Success as a company-wide mindset.

Sales, Marketing, Product, Support, Finance, and Engineering all influence whether customers achieve the outcomes they came for.

That’s Customer Success.

Customer Success Management is different.

CSMs provide the structure after the sale — guiding customers through adoption, value realization, and ongoing success while coordinating the teams needed along the way.

When companies leave everything to CSMs, CS becomes the dumping ground.

When companies say “everyone owns CS” but nobody owns the journey, customers get lost.

The right answer is both.

The whole company needs a Customer Success mindset.

And CSMs still need to own and coordinate the customer journey.

🎥 Watch the clip below.