Anika Zubair (00:00.28)
Hello everyone, welcome back to the Customer Success Pro Podcast, your go-to space for real talk on how to grow your career, become more strategic, and drive real revenue as a CSM. Have you ever heard of a customer go radio silent right after onboarding? Or maybe worse, they churned right before their first renewal even comes up. That might be because they never got to the value point in value realization.

And in today's episode, we are going to dive into one of the most underrated metrics in customer success, which is time to value. Because if your customers don't quickly see the impact of your product, they won't stick around to experience the rest. Hello, everyone. I'm your host, Anika Zuber, and welcome to the Customer Success Pro Podcast, your go-to space for real talk, expert advice, and actual insights in the world of customer success.

I'm a CS executive leader, award-winning strategist, CS coach, and customer success fanatic. I help CSMs and CS leaders build the skills and the confidence to become revenue driving pros and scale world-class CS teams. So whether you're brand new to CS or a seasoned leader, this podcast is here to support your growth. Because customer success isn't a destination, it's a journey.

and I'm here to be your guide and navigate every step of your journey. So join me every Wednesday where you'll get fresh CS tips, tricks, and strategies you can actually use. Some weeks I'll share my own insights and best practices from working in CS over the last 13 years. And once a month, I'll bring on expert guests to dive into the most relevant and pressing topics in customer success today. So if you're ready to level up

hit subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you tune in. And let's make your CS journey a little bit easier together.

Anika Zubair (02:04.761)
Here's the reality. In SaaS, customers don't buy software. They buy outcomes. And if those outcomes take too long to happen, you're going to lose momentum and you're going to lose your stakeholder. They're going to lose buy-in and they're just really not going to be interested. And eventually, you will lose that customer. Time to Value, or TTV for short, is all about how fast your customer realizes their version of success with your product.

Now I want to say that again, it is how fast your customer realizes their version of success with your product. We have a problem in customer success and we think that we know our customers success based on metrics that we measure internally and that we see as successful with our product. But time to value is all about how quickly your customer perceives value of

your product, not necessarily what you think is prescribed as best. But here's where most CSMs go wrong. They either don't define value or they don't track value or they don't accelerate the progress of reaching it. And that's what's going to be costing you, not just in retention, but in your own credibility as a strategic partner. So let's break this down. Time to value is the amount of time it takes you from when your customer signs the contract

to when they first experience meaningful value from your product. Now listen, time to value is not completing a checklist, especially not an onboarding checklist, because I know we all love an onboarding checklist. And time to value is not a successful training call. It's actual value. What outcomes do your customers care about? In other words, when they say, this is exactly what we needed,

That is time to value. And why does this matter so much? Well, first of all, it matters because of retention. The longer it takes you to get value, the more likely your customer is going to churn. And also, it affects expansion. A customer who gets early value is more likely to say yes to an upsell. And you know what else it affects? It affects internal credibility. Tracking and improving time to value to your leadership team

Anika Zubair (04:27.011)
will actually show them that you understand how to drive outcomes and how driving outcomes lead to revenue growth. This is how you get promoted. This is how you move from relationship manager to strategic revenue driver. This is how you get a seat at the business executive table because you are accelerating the time that it takes for your customers to start to see value. And as a result of them seeing value,

they are going to renew or upsell quicker, which to your business is music to its ears. Okay, let's talk about some mistakes that are probably sabotaging your time to value. First of all, I have to say that your generic onboarding journey is probably hurting you rather than helping you. Now, if your customer gets the same onboarding experience, whether they're an enterprise or an SMB, or whether they have high touch or mid touch or low touch, you're probably already behind.

value is not a one size fits all. And I want you to remember that each of your customers is probably going to value your product totally different. And that's totally okay, but I need you to realize that value is not one size fits all, which means onboarding cannot be one size fits all. Now, the second mistake that I see happen time and time again is that CS pros do not define value with your customer. Now,

I already said it before, but the problem I see happening too often in customer success is that we internally map value or we internally decide what is valuable to our customers. Now, it's okay as a starting point, by the way, to create value maps and value milestones for your customers. I totally get that you want to be a guide and help your customers, but the mistake I see happen time and time again is CS pros end up thinking that that is exactly what their customer wants without actually

asking them. So if you don't ask what does success look like to you, to your customers, then how do know when value is actually achieved? Again, create value markers, create milestones in the customer journey or in onboarding, but you need to validate these with your customers. And if you're not validating them, you're just assuming that you know what they need. And what's going to happen is your customer is going to be like, well, my CSM just doesn't get me. They don't understand what I care about.

Anika Zubair (06:51.991)
And so I'm no longer going to be interested in the calls or the onboarding checklist or whatever else you're doing with them. And they're going to ghost you and you're basically losing a customer at that point. So you need to validate with your customer what's valuable to them. Because like I said, even if you have 10 customers in the same exact industry, some might have different values than others. And you need to make sure that's mapped out based on a conversation with them. Okay, another thing that I see happen way too often is we...

tend to overload our customers early on. So we basically create too much too soon and that creates tons of confusion for our customers and not clarity. Value needs to feel achievable, not overwhelming. So when you first build a success plan or you first outline the first 30, 60 or 90 days with your product, don't go overboard. Keep it simple. Remember, your customers are busy people. They're running around, running their own businesses, doing their own thing.

Your software is just one of 50 different softwares within their company tech stack. Do they want a checklist or a to-do list or a success plan with 100 steps and 100 goals and outcomes to achieve? No. Are they going to need that full checklist at some point? Of course they are. Of course they're going to want to know all the things. Of course they're going to want to achieve everything. Every customer is super excited to buy your product in the first early days. But

Your job in being strategic is to streamline that information to your customer so that they feel like they have a direct path and that they can achieve a quick win or a quick goal. So do not overwhelm your customers. Keep it simple. Keep it straightforward. And as they accomplish things in onboarding and as they achieve certain milestones of success, then you can add further goals. But please do not allow your customer to say, we have 10 really big goals for the product.

That's awesome that they do capture those goals. I'm not saying don't capture it, but do not present them with those 10 goals and all the steps of reaching those goals in one meeting. It's just overwhelming. It's not going to feel achievable to them. Okay. And one other thing that I want to mention that I see happen too often, and I know I've been guilty of this personally in my career as well, is CSNs tend to own the journey solo. Meaning that you are basically trying to do it all for your customer.

Anika Zubair (09:17.763)
by yourself. I list this in. I know that in customer success, we all have this hero complex where we need to be everything to our customer. But in order for your customer to see value from your product and service, and in order for you to accelerate the time to value, the number one mistake that you're going to make is if you do not partner with other teams internally in order to make sure time to value is realized.

Now, I made the mistake early on and I know a lot of other people listening to this podcast probably also made this mistake. But if you're not partnering with sales or product or the onboarding teams, your time to value will always be limited and will always feel far away. Remember, this is a customer for the whole company. Yes, of course, you are the strategic advisor and you are advising and guiding them and helping them see value from the product.

But that doesn't mean you have to do this all alone. That means that you have to call on the onboarding teams. You have to call the sales, the marketing, the product, the legal team to help realize time to value. Your job is to orchestrate all of this so that time to value accelerates. But please do not try to do it alone because when you do it alone, first of all, I've seen way too many people burn out from trying to do it alone, but it's not going to serve your customers. Doing time to value or making sure your customers reach value as quickly as possible,

It's gonna burn you out and it's gonna be exhausting and it's a team sport. So make sure you don't do it alone. Okay, here are my hottest tips on how you are going to reduce time to value and stand out as a strategic customer success pro. First of all, I want you to define value early, but I also want you to make it measurable. And the way you wanna do this is in the first call that you have with your customer, maybe it's in a call with the sales team or a kickoff call, whatever it is,

I want you to ask the question, what's the most important outcome you want from our tool in the next 30 days? Keep it simple, give them a timeline, ask them. There's only one. They can only pick one thing. Remember, you have to guide them that if they say three or five different things, say, that's great. But if you had to pick one thing, what is that one thing that you want to make sure our tool does in the next 30 days? Then you need to align your entire

Anika Zubair (11:38.047)
onboarding plan around that. That is the most important thing to highlight because they are saying that is the biggest outcome that matters to their business right now with using your product or service and you need to work towards that. Of course, they're going to say, we have seven other goals to achieve with your tool as well. But as a strategic advisor, you need to remind them that they only have two hands and they only have a team of X number of people and we only have 30 days.

for the first milestone. We of course are gonna reach all the other milestones that you're interested in, but we need to make things tangible and practical and take it step by step. So we're gonna only focus on the first goal for now. Your customer will appreciate this level of direction and control that you're taking of the conversation because they know that you're gonna be holding them accountable to the value they're gonna see in that first 30 days.

Hey, CS Pros, are you tired of being told to drive more revenue without ever being shown how? Or maybe you've been stuck in back-to-back calls or scrambling to prepare for QBRs, or maybe you're trying to add value, but the truth is you don't feel confident driving renewals or upsells. You're always guessing and you're not actually growing. Now, picture this. You know exactly how to lead a strategic conversation that ties directly to revenue.

You're tracking goals, proving ROI, and your customers actually look forward to your calls. You feel like a revenue leader, not a ticket taker. That's exactly what happens inside of RevUp Academy, my flagship coaching program for customer success pros who want to crush revenue targets without sounding salesy. The doors are officially open.

but only until July 18th. And if you're serious about becoming a top performing CS Pro in 2025, this is your chance to learn the skills that it will set you apart and help you get that next promotion. In order to enroll, all you have to do is go to thecustomersuccesspro.com forward slash rev up. Enroll today and you will feel like a revenue rock star tomorrow.

Anika Zubair (13:56.067)
Remember, seats are limited and your next promotion might just depend on this. So enroll today and get the help that you deserve to hit those revenue targets. Just go to thecustomersuccesspro.com forward slash rev up. Now back to our episode. Okay, my next tip on reducing time to value is you're gonna create a value milestone map. Now, I don't want you to just list onboarding tasks. I want you to break it into

Value milestones each one should clearly show how it impacts the customer goals remember these aren't checklists like set up integration and Check with the tech team and integrate with legal services or whatever those are checklist items Remember that one goal that they care about that they're trying to achieve in the first 30 days now I want you to take all of the checklist items and Tie it back to the goal if it doesn't actually impact the goal

you could probably remove it from your onboarding checklist because it doesn't matter. Okay, now that you've got all of this planned out and mapped out, I want you to use success plans for progress. Success plan isn't just for your QBR, it's a blueprint, it's a guide, it's literally everything. It's a living, breathing document for proving value week by week. So now that you have the customer goal and you have the plan of action to reach that goal in 30 days,

with outcomes and value milestones every single week that you get on a customer call, I want you to bring up this living and breathing document with your customer and I want you to show them, my gosh, look how much progress we made. Look at all the things we've done. Look at all the value that you are seeing week on week to achieve your goal. That is going to be game changing because your customer is really going to start to feel the value when you showcase it in that way. and also,

While you are showing the success plan, I want to make sure that you are tracking and communicating weekly wins. Every single time you do bring up that success plan with your customer and every single time you're showing them the value that is being perceived through the success plan, keep your champion in the loop about the progress. Even better, keep your main stakeholder in the loop. So if you have an executive buyer that's no longer maybe on the onboarding calls, because it just doesn't make sense because it's more of a practical job for the tech team to do,

Anika Zubair (16:17.859)
That's okay. You don't have to have all your stakeholders on onboarding. But what I want you to do is use that success plan and keep everyone in the loop of the progress and highlight every mini win with metrics, results, anything that speaks their language and speaks to their goal. Trust me again, your customer will get more and more excited. And what's really great about doing this is when your customer first signed with your product or service, they were really excited and no customer

stays that excited for the entire time that they are a customer with your product or service. They kind of get used to it and they kind of just see you as another tool. But we want to build on that sales momentum. We want to build on the momentum that they were so excited to close the deal and to actually purchase your software. And as DS Pros, we want to continue that momentum. We want to make sure our customers are excited about everything that they're building with us.

So make sure you continue to loop people in about the mini wins and keep the energy high. Okay, one other thing that you can do to reduce time to value is collaborating across teams. Remember how I said that we're heroes and we like to do everything ourselves? Well, I need you to stop that. Please stop because the more you do it yourself, the more you're slowing your customer down. And I really hope that you're hearing me on this. We need to stop being heroes in customer success and we need to realize that looping in product managers

from the very second call or even the onboarding call or even the kickoff call is going to save so much time. And to make sure onboarding team actually understands outcomes and goals and value maps, that's gonna save so much time. Remember, one email or Slack update to the wider company can shave days off of time to value. But remember, you cannot do it alone. You have to loop in other teams. Okay, you know me and you know I love a-

Practical example of exactly what I'm trying to coach you on today So what I want to do is give you a practical example of reducing time to value So think of it like a restaurant your customer didn't come in to read the menu or admire the decor or chat with the waiter Those are all byproducts of coming into a restaurant. They came in hungry They were hungry and they wanted to eat and they'll only return if the food is gonna arrive quickly and hits the spot

Anika Zubair (18:40.882)
and make sure that they feel satisfied with their meal. Now listen, your job isn't just to welcome them in. Your job is to serve the right dish as quickly as possible and make sure it satisfies them. That is how you turn first time guests in a restaurant into regulars. And that is exactly what you need to do with your customers. This week, I want you to run a quick audit. I want you to look at your newest customer and I want you to ask yourself,

Have I defined what value looks like with them? Can I articulate the first key milestone? And how fast are we moving towards that outcome? And once you go ahead and finish this weekly challenge, I want you to let me know. Go ahead and message me on LinkedIn, or you can reply to this podcast with your answer. Or if you want, can text me. It's all in the show notes. I always love to hear what you uncover and your

practical ways of using this podcast. OK, let's wrap up. So we talked about what time to value actually means in SAS and why time to value is critical not just for your customers, but for your career growth. We also covered the top mistakes that CSMs make that slow down time to value. And then, of course, I showed you how to fix it with clear, measurable value-driven onboarding.

And we also covered my example of a simple mindset shift that can turn onboarding into outcome delivery. All right, if this episode lit a fire under you and you're ready to master skills like what we covered in today's podcast that's going to get you promoted faster, then don't wait.

Join me inside of CSM RevUp Academy. Remember, enrollment is open right now. All you have to go is to thecustomersuccesspro.com forward slash rev up to enroll to really help you become the revenue rock star that you were always destined to be. But hurry enrollment closes on July 18th. So go to the customer success pro.

Anika Zubair (20:53.11)
That's all for this week and I hope you enjoyed this episode and I'll catch you next week for our next podcast episode. Thanks for tuning in to the Customer Success Pro Podcast. I hope you picked up something valuable to take back to your team. If you enjoyed this episode, it would mean the world to me if you took just 10 seconds to leave a review

on Apple or Spotify. It helps more CS pros like yourself discover the show. And creating new episodes takes a lot of work, so leaving a nice review keeps me motivated to keep creating. And don't forget to hit subscribe on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you listen to podcast episodes. I drop a new episode every Wednesday packed with practical tips. And if you've got a topic you'd love for me to cover or want to be a guest on my show,

Send me a message. All the details are in the show notes. I'd love to hear from you. And hey, if this episode helped you, share it with a fellow CSM or CS leader. Remember, sharing is caring. Cheers to your CS journey, and I'll catch you next week for our next episode.