By Jan Young
The Sales to Customer Success handoff is a critical phase in the customer relationship. It marks the transition from the Buyer’s Journey to the Customer’s Journey. A successful handoff ensures that the trusted advisor relationship extends beyond the initial Account Executive. It also allows the Customer Success Manager to build a relationship with the Decision Maker that can de-escalate fire drills, expand revenue, and deliver the value the Buyer originally envisioned.
During the Buyer’s Journey, the Account Executive developed trust with the Decision Maker, set the customer’s expectations, and personified the company and the product. If this trusted advisor relationship is not transferred over to Customer Success, it can delay or derail onboarding and relegate the CSM to a relationship with the Champion who may influence, but ultimately cannot make decisions.
Organizations large and small, early stage to mature, and simple to complex technologies all need to address this critical period when “Buyer’s Remorse” can make a hard-won deal go south. Following are some best practices to consider.
Set Yourself Up For Success
Your Sales to Customer Success handoff starts first with internal education and agreement. The Sales, Customer Success and Revenue Operations leaders need to agree on and train their teams on:
How Sales understands the roles of the CS and Onboarding functions, and how they introduce them to the Customer with proper expectations:
EXAMPLE, What not to do:
Sales introduces the CSM as “a helper”.
IMPACT: The Decision Maker will expect to maintain a relationship with the AE and treat CS like a Support function. This will pull the AE into every fire drill instead of focusing on selling. The “helper” positioning doesn’t set the foundation for a strategic CSM relationship, and doesn’t allow Support to function properly either.
EXAMPLE, What to do:
Sales introduces the CSM as the strategic partner who will ensure the customer optimizes their usage of the product so that their objectives are met, and who will inform the customer of new developments and products that help them achieve success.
Introduce the Onboarding Manager as the person who will set expectations, timelines, requirements, and next steps for a successful deployment. Have an agreed timeline for best-case onboarding and what each party needs to do by when to meet that timeline, and a commitment from the customer for their part.
NOTE: When the CSM and Onboarding Manager are the same person, clearly define the phases of the Customer Journey and how the CSM will maintain different types of contact with different customer personas so each persona receives the pertinent information they need. Delineating these relationships results in the CSM holding trusted advisor relationships throughout the customer’s organization.
Whether to introduce the CSM and Onboarding Manage prior- or post-deal signature:
This decision depends on both your deal cycles and the complexity of the onboarding. The key to this is knowing when the Decision Maker is engaged and when they start to transfer attention. Is there a weak point in the Sales cycle where introducing the CSM would help the Buyer understand the value of the product?
While the Decision Maker is still involved, introduce the CSM and start to capture the Customer’s goals in a Joint Success Plan. Then invite the Decision Maker to the Kick-Off meeting to share their vision and goals for the purchase.
NOTE: If you choose to hold off on introductions because of time constraints, you may want to re-examine your customer journey and processes, your team structure, and your CSM to Customer ratio.
Materials and processes needed to support the handoff and Customer conversations:
When and how are you training your SDRs and AEs? Do your CSMs and Onboarding team understand their role in the process and the customer relationship? Is everyone on the same page?
Will you retrain your team in regular meetings, special trainings, employee onboardings? How do you ensure your messaging is consistently communicated to the customer?
What new processes and supporting materials are needed to implement the Sales to CS handoff?
Documentation during the Buyer’s Journey is critical. Agree on how and when the teams can most successfully capture the account information so it can be easily found, and triggers can be built that ultimately will be needed by all parties—preferably in a CRM like Salesforce or HubSpot. Some examples of data fields to consider:
Contact information with context (personality quirks, office politics, family, hobbies)
Preferred contact method (can save time and ensure momentum and stronger relationships)
Purchase reasons and goals (this can contribute to the beginning of a Joint Success Plan that the CSM can use as the basis for a strong and continued relationship with the Buyer)
NOTE: When planning the data fields, event triggers, views, dashboards, reports, and workflows, it’s important to think about the WHY and share that with the individuals that will be contributing to and using this information. This not only supports better and more consistent data, it helps each person understand how it leads to a more successful and profitable customer. For example, documentation in the technology stack doesn’t just help the Onboarding process, it also helps Account Executives later when they need references for future Sales.
If your organization has a different Sales process for lower profit or smaller companies than larger, more profitable companies, consider building ways to capture the information directly from the Buyer during the Sales process. It can be as simple as multiple-choice boxes or text boxes in a Google form that uploads to your CRM, but find a way to understand your customer so that you can set proper expectations, build a trusted relationship, and deliver value.
Introduction & Kick-Off to the Customer Journey
Best practice is for the Account Executive to schedule and introduce the purpose of the Kick-Off meeting, required attendees, and the role of the meeting in the Customer Journey. At this stage, the trusted advisor role is still with the AE. If the AE is not proactively introducing the CSM and setting up the Kick-Off, it will likely produce a weakness in the relationships and customer journey, as well as onboarding delays and misunderstandings.
Potential Kick-Off Meeting Agenda:
AE begins with Introductions and Roles (Customer and Company); note how the AE will and won’t be involved going forward
AE reviews what has been purchased
Decision Maker presents their reason for purchase, vision of product use, and how the product helps them meet their business goals and objectives
CSM introduces the purpose of Joint Success Plan, and walks through the current version, soliciting feedback
Onboarding Manager introduces the key points of contact for Implementation, Onboarding stages, timing, and requirements for feedback and agreement
Customer, CSM, and Onboarding Manager review and agree upon next steps; they also establish communication cadence and type
CSM and Decision Maker agree to regularly communicate on the Joint Success Plan and how Onboarding or Adoption supports it
The purpose of the CSM introducing the Joint Success Plan during the Kick-Off meeting after the AE and Decision Maker have reviewed what has been purchased and why solidifies that the trusted advisor relationship has been transferred to the CSM and that they understand the Decision Maker and the customer overall. It also allows the other key points of contact who will be involved in the Implementation to understand their role in achieving the Decision Maker’s business goals and ensures that momentum will be maintained for a timely onboarding.
Ultimately, after the Kick-Off meeting, everyone should be able to answer: What does Success mean?
Documentation & Communication Post Kick-Off
A robust Sales to Customer Success handoff provides the foundation for a strong customer relationship as well as the activities and profitability of a successful Customer Journey. The Kick-Off meeting should transfer the trusted advisor role from the AE to the CSM and establish the CSM as the strategic partner to the Customer Decision Maker. Post Kick-Off, account documentation should continue in the tools that serve as the “Source of Truth” for future reference by the Sales, Marketing, Revenue Operations, and Product teams as well as daily use by the Onboarding and Customer Success teams.
This article was inspired by a LinkedIn post that I wrote about a Sales to Customer Success handoff that I was helping a client to revamp. Special thanks to the following Customer Success leaders and enthusiasts who contributed to the conversation and helped me clarify my thoughts on the topic: Rachel Askin, Viviana Bertinetto, Guy Galon, Ashley McCullough, Funmilayo Ojeleye, Rachel Provan, Jade Ranjalahy, Michael Roberts, Harsh Shah, and Michael Su.
Want to help your team understand and work with sales more effectively? The Success League is a consulting firm that offers a CSM Certification Training Program that includes selling-focused classes like Uncovering Opportunities and Managing a Selling Cycle. For more information on these classes and our other offerings, please visit TheSuccessLeague.io
Jan Young - Jan is passionate about lifelong learning, demystifying technology, optimizing teams, processes, and systems, and building effective relationships and communities. Her experience has included working in Enterprise companies and Startups of various stages, and she has advised several founders and startups. She serves on the board of Gain, Grow, Retain as co-lead of the Voice of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion council, and is a Founding Community Lead for CS Insider for which she writes and curates a series called “Inclusive Innovation”, and was recognized as a 2021 Top 100 Customer Success Strategist for her work in the community. She holds a BA from UC Berkeley, and an MBA from Columbia University. In her free time, she enjoys wine tasting, hikes, and Pickleball.