Doing the work

How do I run a QBR that the customer does not find a waste of time?

The short answer

Stop opening with your usage dashboard. Open with the outcome they told you they were buying, and show progress against it in their numbers, not yours. Bring one thing they did not know: a benchmark against similar customers, a workflow their peers use, a place they are leaving value on the table. Spend the second half on what is next, not on the last quarter. And be honest about problems, because a QBR that only celebrates is the one where the customer stops sending their executive. If nobody senior on their side attends twice in a row, that is your real signal, more than any slide in the deck.

Go deeper, your way

5 hand-picked resources, 1 India-specific, 5 link-checked. Pick how you want to dig in.

The same ground, at another level

How customer success and retention reads from a different seat.

When should I hire my first customer success person? Earlier than feels comfortable. The usual trigger is two or three customers big enough that losing one would hurt, plus a founder who is spending m... Breaking into GTM 5 resources → How do I structure a customer success team once one person is not enough? Pick your organising axis on purpose. By segment (enterprise, mid market, SMB) is the default and works when your customers differ mostly in size. ... Leading a GTM team 5 resources → GitLab publishes its entire customer success handbook. What is worth copying? Three things. The renewal tracking process, because it shows what a renewal looks like as an operational pipeline with stages and owners rather tha... How the best do it 4 resources →

People also ask

When should I hire my first customer success person? Earlier than feels comfortable. The usual trigger is two or three customers big enough that losing one would hurt, plus a founder who is spending m... Breaking into GTM 5 resources → What is the difference between customer success and customer support? Support is reactive and ticket shaped: the customer has a problem, you solve it, you close it. Customer success is proactive and outcome shaped: yo... Breaking into GTM 4 resources → I just got handed my first set of accounts. What do I actually do in the first 30 days? Read the deal before you talk to anyone. Find out what the customer was promised, who signed, who will actually use it, and what they said success ... Breaking into GTM 5 resources → What does a good customer onboarding actually look like? Good onboarding is measured in time to first real value, not in how many training sessions you delivered. Pick one observable moment that means the... Breaking into GTM 5 resources → How do I build a customer health score that actually predicts churn? Start with four to six inputs, not twenty. The ones that earn their place are depth of product usage (not logins), breadth across the account, supp... Doing the work 5 resources → My champion at a big account just left. What do I do? Move within 48 hours, before someone else defines your product for the new person. Send a short personal note to the incoming contact congratulatin... Doing the work 4 resources →

Also in Starting Up

The same ground, over in Grow & market, our Starting Up track.

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Also in D2C

The same ground, over in Grow organically & retain, our D2C track.

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