#1-Retention vs Churn
Let's talk about retention and churn – two sides of the same coin that can make or break a business. Think of them as your business's vital signs: retention is the healthy heartbeat you want to maintain, while churn is the fever you need to keep in check.
1. What Are We Actually Talking About Here?
First things first – let's break these terms down into plain English.
Retention is your ability to keep customers coming back for more. It's pretty straightforward: take the number of customers you have at the end of a period, divide it by the ones you started with (minus any newbies), and there's your retention rate. Simple.
Now, you might be thinking, "Why not just focus on getting new customers?" Sure, you could – but here's the kicker: acquiring new customers is like buying a round of drinks for the whole bar, while keeping existing ones is like buying a refill for your friend. Studies consistently show that keeping customers happy is way cheaper than finding new ones. (I'd link to those studies right here, but you get the point.)
This is especially crucial if you're running a subscription business. In the SaaS world, retention isn't just a metric – it's the metric. Some folks even call it the "north star" metric, though personally, I think that's just a fancy way of saying "really important number.”
Churn is what happens when customers wave goodbye to your service. Maybe they found something better, maybe your product didn't live up to the hype, or maybe they just didn't like your latest redesign (it happens). Whatever the reason, they're gone – and they're probably not coming back. Worse yet, if they left angry, they might tell others about their bad experience.
It's like getting a bad Airbnb review, but with bigger consequences:
You lose their recurring revenue (ouch)
You can kiss future upsell opportunities goodbye (double ouch)
They might tell their friends to stay away (triple ouch)
The bottom line? As a CSM (and as a business), you face two scenarios:
Best case: your customers stick around and keep paying. Good job.
Worst case: they leave, your revenue takes a hit, and you’re back to square one. Not good.
Quick Truth Bomb: Churn isn't just Customer Success's problem. It's everyone's problem. From Product to Sales to Engineering – everyone plays a part in keeping customers around. The best SaaS companies get this and make retention a company-wide obsession.
2. The Real Deal About Customer Success
Let's cut to the chase about what Customer Success really means. The clue's in the name – it's about making your customers successful. Why? Because successful customers don't leave. It's that simple.
Your job in CS isn't to be a glorified customer service rep or a professional friend-maker. Instead, think of yourself as a trusted advisor. Your mission is to figure out what success looks like for each client and build a roadmap to get them there.
Real Talk: I've seen too many CSMs get stuck playing the "happiness" game. Here's why that's a problem:
First off, trying to define happiness is like trying to nail jelly to a wall – good luck with that. Now multiply that challenge by hundreds of clients. Yep, not happening.
Second, it makes CS folks play it safe instead of being honest when customers are doing it wrong. That's like watching someone walk toward a cliff and not saying anything because you don't want to hurt their feelings.
I've had plenty of clients who rarely needed to talk to me but were crushing it because I focused on the right things: tracking their success metrics, flagging opportunities for improvement, and making sure they were getting real value.
3. Making Success Happen
Success isn't a one-size-fits-all t-shirt. It's more like a custom-tailored suit – it needs to fit your client perfectly. And the only way to get that fit right is by having real conversations with your clients.
1. The "Why" Game
Ever played the "why" game with a five-year-old? Well, it turns out that annoying habit of asking "why" over and over is actually quite helpful here. It's called root-cause analysis, and it's your best option for understanding what your clients really need.
Here's a real example from my days at Typeform:
Talking to an HR Business Partner at a large Fintech company:
Why do you need a form builder? To run a company-wide survey.
Why? To understand what employees think about the company.
Why? To spot and fix any issues.
Why? To build a stronger company culture.
Why? Because we're haemorrhaging talent and need to stop the bleeding.
See what happened there? We went from "need a form" to "trying to solve a serious employee turnover problem" in five questions. That's gold. Having the whole picture is the best way to go the extra-mile when demonstrating the product, suggesting ways of improvement or pitching new uses cases.
This isn't a rigid framework – it's more like a conversation guide. The goal is to dig until you hit the real issue, not to annoy your client with endless questions.
Also, if your customers mostly come from the sales team (which wasn’t the case at Typeform), you’ll want to coordinate with your sales colleagues. They definitely did some of this work and can provide valuable insights.
2. Setting Success Goals
Once you know what your client really needs, you can set concrete goals. In the HR example above, we could target specific response rates or aim to beat their previous survey performance by X%.
The key is getting your client to buy into these goals. Oh also, I highly recommend documenting everything – it’ll help you write the success plan and future you will thank past you.
Quick recap:
Find the root problem
Set a measurable goal
Get client buy-in
3. Game Plan
Now comes the fun part – building a strategy to hit those goals. For our HR friend, that meant:
Showing them how to create HR surveys in Typeform (pulse-check & exit survey)
Sharing best practices for survey questions (length, depth & tone)
Having regular meetings to assess progress and answer questions
Suggesting different ways to distribute the survey (internal messaging, emails, etc)
Building the campaign timeline
Nobody wants to read a novel-length email about strategy. Keep it simple, make it actionable, and tie everything back to their success metrics.
3. Conclusion
Let's wrap this up with a straight-shooting conclusion.
Here's the thing: retention isn't some mysterious force that's out of our control. It's the direct result of whether customers are actually getting what they came for.
Throughout this article, we've peeled back the layers of what makes customers stick around (or head for the exit). The big revelation? It's not about sending them birthday cards or bombarding them with check-in calls. It's about being 100% focused on their success. And yes, that means actually figuring out what success means to them – not just nodding along during quarterly business reviews.
The root-cause analysis is precisely made for that. It's your best tool for getting to the heart of what your customers really need. Because if you don't know why they bought your product in the first place, you're basically throwing darts in the dark.
Here are the three things you can take away from this:
Dig Deeper Than Surface Problems: That first answer your customer gives you about why they need your product? It's probably not the whole story. Ask "why" until you get to the real meat of the issue.
Don’t Chase Happiness: your customers didn't sign up for a friendship bracelet – they signed up to solve a problem. Focus on helping them hit their goals, and the retention will follow. A customer who's crushing their KPIs isn't going anywhere.
Everyone's in the Retention Game: the CS team might be leading the charge, but retention is a team sport. From the engineers building the product to the sales team setting expectations – everyone plays a part in keeping customers around.
Remember: at the end of the day, it's not about fancy strategies or complicated frameworks. It's about understanding what your customers need to achieve and helping them get there.
