S2E1: How to Build a Customer Success Empire Ft. Irit Eizips

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So everyone, welcome to 15 minutes with Judy.

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I'm Judy Plotch, Chief Customer Officer at Support Logic.

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And today I have the honor of being joined by EREEP's,

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the Chief Executive Officer and Chief Customer Officer for the CSM practice.

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I'm not going to embarrass both of us by saying how long we've known each other

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but I did some counting the other day.

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And we're into decades now.

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I don't know if you realize that.

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So thank goodness everybody else is getting older and we're not, right?

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You're such an industry phenom in the customer success world,

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but I know we'll have some people on here who may not have that background.

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Would you be willing to share a bit about your background, EREEP?

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Yeah, I think I, you know, all my life I've been a consultant.

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Obviously I worked with customers and I was very familiar with almost like the

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challenge of you're doing something for the company, you're delivering on an

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SLW, a statement of work and you're not really sure what the impact is.

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And you're missing that connection of did I deliver value to my client?

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And if so, what was that value?

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And the first time that I heard about customer success is when I had a call

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with

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gentleman by the name Jim Eberlin, who is the founder of Gainsight,

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who also was the CEO of Host Analytics, another company that he established

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earlier on.

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And he invited me to his journey in setting up the company.

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He just got some founding and he told me, hey, I'm going to get a new CEO.

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His name is Nick Maida.

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He should come meet him two weeks later.

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His story was made and I've worked with Gainsight for about a year and a half.

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And then I went back to consulting, which is what I do.

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And because it was so important for me to be part of that customer success

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movement,

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the writing was on the wall.

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It's going to be a big thing.

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And I realized there's just so much we can do as a software company, impacting

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the entire

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industry.

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I felt like I could have a much more broader impact if I actually had a YouTube

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channel

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where I can interview people on what was helpful for them.

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If I had my own consulting firm where I can help more companies that might not

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be able

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to afford a CSP, a customer success platform.

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And that's what I did.

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I started the first customer success strategy consulting firm in the world back

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in July

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2014.

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And back then we had very different conversations with startup and software

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companies.

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I would say that I had an incredible journey and an incredible time being

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impactful

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on this industry and being able to shape the strategies and really spread the

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world around

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customer success.

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And I think that one of the highlights for me was when I have a full one K with

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Schwab

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because I own my own business.

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And Schwab calls me and say, the guy, Aaron, great guy, the first call, he says

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, hey, I'm your

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customer success manager at Schwab.

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And I was like, oh, okay, I guess we're in financial institutes now.

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So this is how big customers success become.

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And it was a very exciting milestone for me to know, wow, this is the impact we

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actually

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had not just on software and SaaS, but rather on the business world.

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Right, absolutely.

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I'm glad you did what you did.

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I think thousands and thousands of people are and I know that people follow you

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and somebody

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asked me just the other day, do you think we're still recovering from all of

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the changes

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during COVID?

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And I'm like, wow, are we?

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Because they were trying to put a pin in why it feels like there's so much,

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call it loose

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footing, uncertainty, things that are happening with organizations

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transitioning success and

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support, putting them together.

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I talked to someone last week who said his customer success team has moved into

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five different

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reporting structures in the past year.

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It was under product, it was under sales, it was part of support.

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It was reporting to the CEO and then it was moved again.

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So so much is changing.

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What is your feeling right now on not only the strength of the industry, but

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what feels

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like a really changing geography, if you will?

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Well, first.

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I think there's a couple of things here.

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One, what is happening with, I'm just shocked by that story.

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If I'm doing like, who does that?

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I don't think that has anything to do with customer success as much as it has

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to do with

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a leadership at that company, okay?

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Let's just put that.

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And if they don't know where customer success should be, they should either

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listen to podcasts

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like yours and mine to really understand where should customer success be

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positioned in

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the organization or join the TSA and they'll tell them.

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And it's really dependent on your, I would say revenue model, business model

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and customer

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lifecycle, like the company's lifecycle phase.

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With regards to merging customer success with support, I think sometimes it

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makes sense

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and sometimes it absolutely doesn't.

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Again, it depends on the business model at large.

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Let's talk about the economy.

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It's the third point you made, which is, are we still recovering from COVID?

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I think what happened during COVID is that we printed a lot of freaking money.

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And then we started to taking it all away by increasing interest and with

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everything that

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happened during COVID where the supply chain got messed up and prices were

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increasing.

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That hurt a bunch of industries immediately.

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And there's a lagging impact on software companies and other industries that

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weren't

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directly impacted during COVID.

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And we're just now starting to seeing the impact on that.

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So I can tell you that the impact is not really around customer success as it

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is around

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company's ability to kit their hands on funding, on cash, company's abilities

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to retain their

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own customers because of cash flow issues.

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And so now some companies will merge customer success with support because they

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're trying

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to protect the cash flow, not because necessarily it's the best thing since

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sliced bread.

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So you'll see a lot of companies making compromises around best practices,

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around the optimal

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structure potentially, or even have less customer success members in their

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organization or I

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don't know, not investing in consultants that can really help switch things

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around and

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help them make the right decision at the right time in these critical junctures

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So I think that all of that impacts customer success managers.

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This is why they're not being hired as fast as they used to be.

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They're seeing when companies do hire customer success managers, they tend to

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hire more junior

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people sometimes and hope to train them faster because of cash flow issues.

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All of that, Judith, in 2024, when companies are strapped for cash, finding it

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hard to get

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funding, to get loans, this is what they do.

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Yeah, without a doubt.

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Having been in the support industry for so long, right?

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It used to be that support was the first place.

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And now, I think it's support and success are both being viewed almost

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identical when it

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comes to cost reduction efforts, which we know how we feel about that for sure.

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You touched on something and I think it's obviously a highlight when I was

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looking at LinkedIn

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over the weekend.

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You touched on customer companies needing to reduce churn and such.

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You're doing something for the industry on this and you made an announcement

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about your

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90 day churn challenge.

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Yeah, listen, as consultants, you gather a lot of expertise during the years

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and I've been

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doing this for 10 years, working with over 200 companies, large, small, learned

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a lot,

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interviewed 300 people on my channel.

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I had a choice to see, okay, where is this going?

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Clearly, there's a lot of companies right now that struggle with churn, either

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partial

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churn or complete logo churn.

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And so, when you view yourself as somebody that's pivotal in making a

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difference in as many

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companies as possible, you're trying to think, okay, what do they need the most

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right now?

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So I decided to sit down and really think if I had to teach a CEO or an

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executive a few things

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around what do they need to do in a very short time to impact churn and reduce

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it by at least

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1%, why 1% because it's a release, the goal, something that you probably

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accomplish in

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90 days to tell you the truth.

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Some of the companies that have even implemented some of these tactics were

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able to, you know,

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slice their churn by half.

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But as a promise, as a goal, I think it's more realistic to say, let's just

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reduce it by

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1% and let the risk take care of itself.

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I chose strategies that I thought they could implement fairly quickly and have

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seen companies

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and other executives that were on my YouTube channel implement fairly quickly

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because I think

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that some companies are literally doing it running out of time, running out of

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the runways

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really short.

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So if I had to focus them in 90 days, what are the tactics that they should be

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implementing

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right now to get their business better?

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This is what came into the program.

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I'm excited to see where this goes.

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I know that you'll be posting and updating us in the industry.

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I think this is absolutely phenomenal of you.

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So off topic question, but I'm going to ask, if you had one button on your life

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, on your

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career, on everything, you could either have a pause button or a rewind button,

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which

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one would you choose?

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When I was 19, the first thing that I did coming back for the weekend out of my

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military service

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was to go check out the museum because they always had live presentations from

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professors

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from the university coming in and talking about logical thinking and philosophy

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So as soon as I finished my military service, I registered and I applied to a

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degree in philosophy

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and logical thinking.

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I was still living with my mom at the time and she received the letter of

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acceptance from

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the university.

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She didn't like it.

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I ended up, yeah, had to cancel my registration and apply for something a

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little bit more substantial

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that would actually get me a job, which was economic to management.

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Here we are today.

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I would say if I had that rewind button, I would have a completely different

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life.

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I would probably be an artist.

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I would probably do pursue a philosophy and logistical thinking.

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I would probably become a professor in university and the whole concept of

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money and revenues would

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be fleeting for my life.

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Wow.

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As it stands, here we are.

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Here we are.

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I love your answer to that question and I love that you went with me with that

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question.

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Tell me about a success that you've had.

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You can use names or don't use names, but what's the success that you've had

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that you

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want people to think and know, hey, it's possible?

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Well, I have some that are related to personal struggles.

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Obviously, none of us gave this life in general, but in terms of working with

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clients or in

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the industry itself.

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I think my company is in and of itself constant ebbs and flows, if you will, as

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intrepid

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nor.

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So if there's anybody here that has their own business, everybody here

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struggles with

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it.

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And I would say that when I started out my business, I had to really prove that

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even though I wasn't

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a VP of customer success before, I could actually help companies with their

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customer success motions.

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And I struggled so much that I had people that worked with me in the past, past

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my name

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up and recommending other consultants like back in 2014, 15 when I just got

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started.

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They would just pass, would not pass my name on, would not recommend me.

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And though they knew who I was and could have helped me quite a bit because I

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didn't have

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that experience in my resume.

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And my thought around this, Judy, was that the truth always bubbles up.

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And when you have grit and perseverance and you do the right thing, you will

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eventually

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win.

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And it was a struggle.

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I'm not going to lie about it.

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Like this was, it took me a few years before I could say that all these

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industry equilates

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to actually prove that I do have an impact and then I know what I'm saying.

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But I think that the self belief in who you are, what you stand for, what do

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you want

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out of your life and sticking with it, knowing that other people will get that

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as well eventually,

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if you just continued on your path is really, really important.

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And so if you're a CEO and you're struggling right now, get on the right path,

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continue

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with what you believe in, have a really strong vision and take as much help as

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you need so

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that you can get everybody else understand what your company is about so that

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your customers

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understand what you are about.

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If they're leaving you, they probably perceived value is not quite there yet.

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If your team is leaving you, they probably don't really understand what you are

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about yet.

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Strengthen that.

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Keep working on that.

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Everything will come into fruition.

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That's awesome.

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Great advice.

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I know we're going to see each other soon.

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You're actually going to be with us for our first ever support experience

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conference.

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I'm looking forward to seeing you and spending time with you there.

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I want to thank you for being who you are in this industry and being first off,

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just a

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pillar of strength, but a woman who has helped many women.

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And I know that you have a lot of it you do quietly, but it's amazing the

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circle of people

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that I know who then mentioned your name to me.

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And it would be people that you wouldn't expect.

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So I want to thank you for that and I'm glad to know you.

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You mean a lot to me.

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So I have enjoyed our conversation today and I look forward to many more in the

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future.

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Absolutely.

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And I can't wait to have you on my YouTube channel.

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Do this.

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Looking forward to that as well.

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Thank you.

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Have a great day and thank you everyone for listening and participating and we

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look forward

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to our next session.

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