During my 5 years at Gainsight, from SDR to Solutions Consultant, a question that would come up regularly from prospects was, “All of this is great, the health scores, CTAs, etc., but how can I bring this all in one place?” I would always respond with, “Well, that’s a great transition to the final area of Gainsight,” as I opened Gainsight’s Horizon Analytics and proceeded to show what would work best for that particular prospect. The solutions ranged from sharing data with Executives to keeping team alignment during 1:1s. Whatever it might be, Horizon Analytics can visualize the required data to run a successful Customer Success Org.
Knowing that each CS team has different needs, I wanted to compile and share a handful of examples; game-changers for any organization. Horizon Analytics has a dashboard or report suitable for your goals, from simple personal dashboards to advanced ROI tracking.
1. Executive Dashboard
If there is anything that I have learned, it’s that Execs love data. Not just data but clean and organized data. Execs are busy people, and the ability to have data at their fingertips makes all the difference before a critical customer call or board meeting.
Sharing vital customer insights with Execs or your board is a great way to show how much CS is making a difference in the company. And with Gainsights Horizon Analytics, you can easily share the most critical data for an Exec whether they are simply curious or going into a board meeting.
My Favorite Report: Top 20 Accounts by ARR. With this report, you can see the health scores of your highest value customers in one view and make sure they are getting the most attention.
2. 1:1 Dashboard
Getting all the data in one place for your CSMs is one of the most crucial steps in operating a successful org, and 1:1’s are some of the most important meetings you’ll have with your CSMs or Managers.
This dashboard helps narrow your team’s focus but seeing which is most important on any given week or what risk/opportunities are ahead. From Calls to action, health scores, NPS, and CSAT. The options are limitless. Anything you need to make your team successful.
My favorite Report: High Priority Call to Action. Often the workload of a CSM can get overwhelming, with dozens of customers raising issues, forcing you to act fast to determine who to prioritize. Now you can keep a list of those tasks that are most important to
3. CS Performance
Whether your team is just getting off the ground or well established, understanding how a team or teams are performing is crucial as you make decisions from alignment to headcount. For businesses that are getting started with CS or maybe transitioning from traditional Account Management, having a dashboard like this is imperative to illustrate the overall impact CS teams have on the business and your bottom line.
My Favorite Report: Health by CSM Portfolio. There are those who outshine the others in any team and those who might need a bit more assistance getting started. See which of your CSMs are top performers based on the health of their portfolio and allocate the necessary resources.
4. Verified Outcomes (VOs)
Having hard data on the goals that your customers have achieved is extremely important in both any renewal conversations and in proving the *robustness* of your platform. Verified outcomes allow you to use Gainsight to measure qualitative and quantitative data to ensure the platform’s impact.
My Favorite Report: Verified Outcomes Updates. This report shows the user the overall number of VOs and the % of customers with VOs to track ROI, which is helpful during renewal discussions.
5. Reference Manager
In my time in Sales, I’ve never heard the phrase “We have too many referenceable customers.” While everyone wants more references, half of the battle is keeping track of those in a single place. A Dashboard in Gainsight is a great way to do that.
Not only can you track who can be a reference but how many times someone has been a reference. That way, your go-to’s can be rewarded, and make sure they are not being inundated whenever a new request comes in.
My Favorite Report: Won Opptys Influenced by Reference: Customer Success teams need hard KPIs. Health scores and Verified Outcomes are excellent, but when it comes to renewals and new business, ARR is king. See which of your teams fosters the best relationships to drive more references to influence the pipeline.
6. Risk Escalation
CS teams are the front line when it comes to Risks within their customer base. Whether it’s a negative NPS, low adoption, or the customer hasn’t shown up for a meeting in 3 months. Whatever it might be, having the correct information to see which customers, segments, or CSMs are having the riskiest behavior in one place can make the difference when looking at future churn.
My Favorite Report: At-Risk Renewals. Contract renewals that occur without incident are the goal, but they are often not that simple in reality. Keep track of those that may need some extra effort and keep them from being a surprise.
7. Support View
Support teams and Customer Success, at times, are very closely related. No CSM wants to walk into a QBR thinking they have a healthy customer when there are 5 P1 support tickets yet to be resolved.
My Favorite Report: Support Scores. Sometimes the customers who shout the loudest are not the ones you need to focus the most time on. This report allows you to see all of the support-related health scores for your customers and address those of the highest priority.
8. Professional Services
Implementations set the tone for the Customer Lifecycle. If things are delayed, or something breaks, this likely negatively impacts the customer experience. Seeing the status of projects across teams or segments can be vital to determine where additional resources may be needed.
My Favorite Report: Late Onboarding. Whether it is a delayed start or something is blocking the progress of getting a new customer up and running, knowing this is crucial. A good CSM wants to understand the teams involved and track trends across accounts to see if a more systemic issue exists.
Interpreting data is one of the first steps in creating a Customer Success org. Making actionable decisions based on that data will help you take your Customer Success team to the next level. All of these are accessible in Gainsight’s best practice library, Sightline Vault, where you can find these and hundreds of other best practices from both Gainsight and our game-changing customers. For a full look at all that Horizon Analytics has to offer, watch our live launch event here!
