How To Win Over The C‑Suite and Turn Champions Into Heroes w/ Rachel Provan CEO of Provan Success

SPEAKER_01: I was working at one of these startups and working my butt off, just really driving myself insane. And I'd kept all the customers. They were all very satisfied. And I was sensing an attitude from my boss.

I was asking for more headcount. We're buried here, but he would he was just looking at me. He's like, I don't understand how you're so busy. I don't even know what you do here.

SPEAKER_02: Welcome to Customer Unsuccess, the podcast where we cut out the noise and talk with real leaders about their hardest lessons in customer success and other go-to-market motions. I'm your host, Joe DeGrande, and in each episode, we're going to unpack real challenges from real leaders, fail tech implementations, a strategy that didn't yield results or difficult customers. But more importantly, we're going to take those lessons learned and share them with you so that way you can avoid those same mistakes with your team.

So if you're in customer success, sales, or other go-to-market motions, stick around to hear from the best. And let's dig into it. In today's episode, I'm joined by Rachel Proven. She's the founder and CEO of Proven Success.

And we dig into building CS from scratch, from winning over the C-suite and the psychology that actually moves adoption. You'll leave with an outcomes first onboarding flow, how to make champions the hero, and when to TF expansions. Plus, we have a pretty wild story on how she botched an SEC filing and still kept her job. I really enjoyed this conversation.

I hope you do too. Now let's dive in. But otherwise, should we kick this off? SPEAKER_01: I'm ready.

SPEAKER_02: Awesome. Well, Rachel, thank you so much for coming on the Customer on Success podcast. Great to have you. SPEAKER_01: It's my pleasure.

Thank you so much for having me. SPEAKER_02: Awesome. Well, good stuff. So if you're not familiar with Rachel, she is the founder and CEO of Provan Success.

And she's also has about, I think what was it, Rachel, about like 18 or 10 years? SPEAKER_01: Embarrassingly, yes, 18 years. Don't age me. 18.

18. I'm an adult I can't drink. There. SPEAKER_02: That's it.

Well, I'm sure you've gathered a ton of wisdom during that time, regardless. Um, which is again why we're always here. Like, I'm always curious to hear, you know, anybody that's been on the front lines and all the challenges, right? Like, that's why we're here for customer owned success.

I think, you know, we've had, I don't even know by the time this launches, what episode we're at. We're definitely, we're obviously definitely in the double digits, but I've we've gotten some great feedback from the audience, and everyone's looking for more to just how to avoid those mishaps in their career. Um, and I know you've obviously had such a ton of experience, and more specifically, we were talking recently, just kind of just chatting about building a CS department from scratch.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah. SPEAKER_02: And I know that's like a huge undertaking, especially at like startups and things of that nature. And it's like a lot to take on, right? Also, you got to be scrappy.

So I'm curious as far as like were you when you were in that position, like I guess tell me about that story and like kind of how you approached it. And I'm curious to learn, you know, learn more. SPEAKER_01: I mean, in terms of building from scratch, I've done that a number of times at a lot of different companies. Um, you know, some that where I was like the seventh higher, and some, you know, and it's just like a bunch of people who don't really even know what CS is.

Um and I've done it at like Fortune 500 companies that are like, we're gonna have CS now. We have two clients. And I'm like, Yep. You you're a Fortune 500 company.

How do you have two clients? Um, but yeah. Uh so I've I've done it under many different conditions. Um, I've also joined midstream, but I I more often have been a builder.

Um and what I've really found is that most people don't really realize that it is built in stages. You know, it's like because there's very little formal education around customer success. Um, I think there might be somewhere you can major in it at this point, like at one college or something, but it's something you basically learn off the internet for most people, or through and and or through trial and error. Um and I I definitely did that, you know.

I mean, uh at this point I teach it, but there was nobody teaching it at that point. And I was looking at, you know, what are the best practices? What exactly do I need? And I didn't really realize that I was trying to build things that were for much bigger companies, um, and having trouble understanding, like, why aren't I getting the results?

And the the C-suite being like, why don't we have these results? Why don't we have 125 NRR? We're six months in. And I was like, I know, I know.

Terrible, terrible. Um, it's like I had a spreadsheet and one CSM. Um, it's like I gee, I don't know. Uh I don't know.

It couldn't, it couldn't possibly be that I'm completely in over my head. Um but you know, because of that, there there was a lot of time, the time where I didn't know what I was doing. I was just doing the best I can. And the the goal of CS has changed so many times since I started.

Um, you know, from like white glove, consider us a member of your team to like NPS, let's be happy. Uh to, you know, outcomes. And outcomes has really been the thread the whole time. But now to like, no, it's commercial and it always has been.

It's like, okay, boss. Um it's, you know, and what's funny is we've picked up pieces that we have to handle the entire way along, but we never get to put any of them down. And um uh a lot of arms are getting heavy. And something I heard from one of my coaching clients yesterday was uh her boss wants her to build an AI agent to handle uh to handle customer success.

unknown: Yeah. SPEAKER_02: It's like and build when it's like maybe that she doesn't want technical. Yeah. SPEAKER_01: I was like, A, you want someone to build something to replace themselves.

Yeah, no conflict of interest there. Um, and B, you want them to do something that very, very few people can do. Like, I mean, you can create an agent, but the chances of it being any good at all, like if you've tried building custom GPT, like you're gonna have to massage the outputs. And an agent assumes that like it's all perfect and it can talk to another custom GPT, and it's like if you're comfortable with that, you have fun.

But uh, I don't think it's gonna work out the way you want it to. Uh, but I see that, you know, being added to the plate, more and more things being added to the plate. Um, but you know, something I do now is that I I teach new CS leaders how to build and scale a CS department and how to lead a team. Uh, very basic stuff.

Um, and it's kind of how hard to advertise that I was like, no, I'm gonna show you how to do your job because no one else will. And if if you don't know that, it's gonna be a problem. Um, but basically, yeah, that's it. But how to how to do it and do it well.

And the story that I always like to tell is um, you know, I I was working at one of these startups and I was working my butt off. I was exhausted. I was like working till 10 every night because it was, you know, one of these like 10 people startups, and you know, wearing all the hats, doing every, you know, checking every box to make sure I wasn't losing anything. And um and just really driving myself insane.

And I'd kept all the customers, they were all very satisfied. They'd all, you know, I had their outcomes tracked and everything on my Excel file. It wasn't even a Google sheet, no one could see it but me. Um and you know, I was I was sensing an attitude from my boss.

Um, and I was like, I don't know, like he's German, so he always seems kind of like not very la, you know, he's he's not exactly jolly. He was very serious and straightforward, but I was like, there's something, there's something else. Um and like I I was asking for I think more headcount. Um I was like, you know, we're we're just you know, we're buried here.

And you know, if you want to keep getting more clients, we're gonna need more headcount. Cause like we don't have a tool, you won't get me a tool. Um, and we probably didn't need one yet, honestly. Um one more person would have done it, but he he was just looking at me, he's like, I don't understand how you're so busy.

He was like, I mean, I don't even know what you do here. unknown: Yeah. SPEAKER_01: And that's rough. I really think that so many CS leaders have that going on without them knowing that that is what the C-suite is thinking about them without saying it.

Because they're expecting one thing from CS, and it's probably not very realistic based on how much they've enabled them in terms of time, tools, people, processes, clean data. You know, they're expecting an ATM machine, and that's just not how CS works. You know, it's I like to say it's uh it's the broccoli of the business world, it's not sexy. Uh, we're not the cookies, you know, but you you gotta eat your broccoli, or you're not gonna be healthy.

You know, we're we're about long-term health. And honestly, if you think about it, the SaaS model collapses without customer success. Of course, because they rely on retention, and retention is not automatic. And thank God boards are starting to actually recognize that because of course founders don't really.

And I can't blame them so much for that in terms of the psychology. You don't build something and think like, well, I built this, but nobody's ever gonna be able to get anything out of it, you know. Like, no one's gonna think that. They're gonna think like, well, I built the thing, they bought it, we showed them how to use it, success.

And humans do not work like that. You know, computers, computers work like that. That's nice. Um, but you know, I I like to give the analogy that I think I've had five gym memberships and I've never had a six-pack, and that is not the bulk of the gym.

You know, it's we it is really hard to motivate people to to use something. We hate change, we hate new things, we hate having to learn, especially the more AI comes out, we are hating having to learn. It's like, no, just do it for me. I don't want to think.

You do it. Um, yes. My brain is rotting. SPEAKER_02: It's so, it's so interesting because I'm even catching myself in certain things, right?

Where it's like, I'm always not always, I'm sometimes deferring to AI to execute and stuff. I'm like, you know what? And then I'm running around in circles, like, oh, it's hallucinating again. Oh, it's not working.

I'm like, all right, you know what? Why am I even going down this path? Maybe it would have just taken me 10 minutes less by just doing it organically how I've always done. And yeah, yeah, we're in a weird point of understanding like our own minds and how it's interacting with AI.

SPEAKER_01: I mean, I heard um, you know, some reports about how like certain parts of our brain are atrophying, and I was like, I'm not, I'm honestly not that concerned because all it shows is that our brains are incredibly adaptive. Um, you know, it's not going to keep building the same neuropathways if they're not active anymore and you're using different ones. Um, so that stresses me out less, but it is more about you know, reminding myself to keep that human connection. Um and it's funny because it's this balance of like, that is a stupid thing, and I would love to outsource it.

But at the same time, it's like, are you really going to an AI model to write an introductory email? Hi, this person, meet this person. You really can't do that yourself anymore, honey. Like, true.

No, you need to do this yourself just to like not turn into uh one of those creatures in WALL-E. Um but that is, you know, to circle it back to CS, that's why I think we're becoming going to become more and more valuable as the non-human parts of it, as the process parts of it become automated. Um, that's actually a treat for us. I mean, do you want to sit there and update the CRM?

Because I don't. unknown: No. SPEAKER_02: Nobody does. SPEAKER_01: And that's why we have these data problems.

Um, but it's the stupid stuff, the boring stuff like that, that this is here to handle for us. And while AI is really good um at so many things, it really can't um, it really can't catch microexpressions, it can't catch tone, it can't catch all these things that we were evolutionarily engineered for, you know? Right. Um but and because we don't fully understand how the brain works, we can't tell it how to do that.

And I think that's actually a good thing. Um we we don't want it to have the full the full software. Um but yeah, that was that was a big circular conversation that touched on a lot. SPEAKER_02: Yeah, for sure.

No, I love it though. I and I and I took some notes as well. And like there's a couple I go. SPEAKER_00: Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: No, this is great. I think um it's interesting because we we touched on a couple of things. Um one, uh you brought up you brought up the C-suite. I do want to get back to the psych piece too, because it's super, super interesting.

Because I know you've even said yourself you're you're you uh you're self-proclaimed psych nerd, which is great. And it's interesting because it's very important when it comes to like consumer behavior, you know, for adopting you know SaaS. But like going back to C-suite, like in the story, I guess like a lot of times I talk to people like you know, other CS leaders, just you know, CSMs, like what are some tips in terms of like communicating with the C-suite, right? Like in your story, like damn in that particular story, they didn't know what you did in that particular situation, right?

So I guess like how do you combat that or better not so much combat it, but like maybe better prepare yourself for next time, right? And like how do you communicate? Like, tell me more about that. SPEAKER_01: I mean, the funny thing about that is, you know, I was very righteous and indignant for you know, about 13 hours, and I had all these wonderful comebacks in the shower that of course are useless at that point.

Um talking myself and uh and then it hit me that like of course he doesn't know what I do here. I never told him. And he's like a tech guy, you know, like he knows he was basically been a CTO before. Um it's like I'd never bothered to be like, here's what we do, here's how it works, here's what you can expect.

Um, because I assumed that because he was a C-suite, he knew, you know, that he knew more than me. And he didn't. Um, and that doesn't mean that he was bad at his job, you know. Not everyone can know what every department does.

Like as you grow and as you scale, the more you have to have people who specialize in that and be like, here, this is for you. You get to handle this now. So, you know, for the C-suite, and this is something I I teach about a lot, um, that you really have to under be able to understand anyone's perspective. And it's a lot simpler than it sounds.

It's just like, who is this person? How do they keep their job? How does this person keep their job? Because if you look at Maslow's hierarchy of needs, which you only have to be the minorist psych nerd to know about this, but it's basically like a hierarchy of needs.

It starts with the bottom. Like, what do we need? Well, air. If we don't have air, that's the biggest problem, right?

SPEAKER_00: Right. SPEAKER_01: Um, then probably water, then food, then shelter. Um, you know, then we'd like to have some friends. Uh and then we'd like to, you know, move on, you know, we'd like to have some friends, we'd like to have some love, we'd like to um self-actualize is at the top, you know, things like spirituality and you know, becoming the best version of yourself.

How can you impact uh society for a positive way? Um, but moving up that chain is really what our body is designed to do, our body and brain. And it's not really gonna let you deviate from that. Uh, there's a reason we've been alive so long and have evolved this long, and it's because your brain is protecting you.

Uh and it has learned that your job is kind of on that base layer because that affects your food, your shelter, your family. Right? That's how you get your food and shelter. That's how you get it for your family as well.

So it equates your job with basic survival. Um and that causes a lot of problems because there are more than one job. And just because you have a minor issue, like there's a few typos in your report, that's not the same thing as a lion chasing you. But to your brain and the chemicals it releases, it's the same thing.

Your life is now in danger, gotta act now. All the blood flows to, you know, to your hands, your legs, it leaves your brain, making you actively stupider. Um, and you are not in a great position to fix your problems, think logically, think like, oh, here's how I should solve this problem. You're more likely going to spiral.

Like, this is the end of the world, here's what's gonna happen. I'm predicting the future. I know everything that is going to happen, and it's all bad. Okay.

So that's everyone. So, what's gonna make that happen for a person in the C-suite? Who do they report to? They report to the board.

What does the board care about? Money, numbers. SPEAKER_00: Right. SPEAKER_01: That's why, that's why our bosses care about it because that's how they get paid.

Um so looking at that, it's like, all right, well, then whatever I show them, I should probably start with that. So literally anyone you are going to meet with, whether it's a client, whether it is the C-suite, whether it's a member of your CS team, whether it is your mother-in-law, um, you need to ask yourself if the person is gonna look at you with what you've come at and just imagine them saying, like, why should I care? What's in it for me? SPEAKER_00: Right.

SPEAKER_01: And it's not that everyone's innately selfish. It's just that's what they're paying attention to. That's what they're laser focused on. So if you can show them what is in it for them and why they should care, you're gonna have a much better conversation.

Because if you lead with what you care about, they're not thinking about that and they don't really care. You know, do you care about what marketing wants and needs? Like, probably not unless they're messing you up. You know, it's like wish you well, but you know, I got stuff to do.

And that's how other departments feel about us. Um, like, you're really screwing me up here. It's like, I'm sorry. I cannot help you, like I cannot help that.

I've got my job to do. Um, so instead of leading with, you know, like if we don't have, you know, two more hires, we're not gonna be able to handle our book of business, you know, people might leave. Uh and like, yeah, while that sounds bad, you know, and people are gonna be sympathetic to that. That's very different than, you know, I would estimate uh we're not gonna be able to handle at our current capacity and our current rate of growth, that we're not going to be able to handle this uh this volume after October.

And while we might be okay for a little while, there will be irreversible churn that will happen six months later, but it will be because of what we start doing in October. So you're gonna end up, if we don't do something by October, we're gonna end up with, you know, an additional uh, it depends on your company,$750,000 a churn. You know, just give it a number, give it a percentage. You, and I cannot emphasize this enough you do not have to be 100% sure of the number.

You can be 60% sure of the number, and that is fine because there's no way for anyone to verify it. People just want A general idea of what's going on. I'm not saying to make it up, but it's like generally when people are making these decisions and estimates, it's they say if you have an idea between 40 and 70 percent, make the call. Because if you wait for a hundred, the call's gonna be made for you.

So what does this person care about? Numbers. So what did I do? I went in, I led with the numbers.

That's what's in it for you. You're gonna get hurt here. And I didn't say, like, oh, if you hire more people, it's going to um boost retention, it's going to boost expansion. I didn't say that because loss is much more powerful than gain to our brain.

We, you know, we all like the sound of gaining something, but oh, you're gonna lose something that you're already counting on. There's nothing the brain hates more. And that is something that we can use in customer success, especially to our existing clients. It's like, you know, it's like, okay, I I understand, you know, but do you realize what you'll be losing here?

All this time that you've invested, um, you know, and all, you know, all these records, all, you know, helping them understand what they're gonna lose access to. It's like, well, what how do you plan on um doing this without without our product? Are you gonna do it manually? Okay, what will you not be able to do because you're doing that?

What are you taking off your plate? You know, yeah. Interesting. It it brings in the oh shoot, you know.

Now I don't care if they're never using your product. Saying that is going to make the thing like, I don't have time, what the hell am I gonna do? Um true. I do care if they're never using your product.

Obviously, I'm in CS, but um these are the ways that you can use how the brain works to help you in CS because I'm gonna tell you the way the brain works is really not friendly to CS from the executive level. Um, it's something called hyperbolic discounting, which basically means the longer out the reward is, the less I care. The less I believe it exists. It only matters if it's gonna happen now.

The further we get away from it, the less, you know, it could be a million dollars, but you tell me it's two years out, it's like, yeah, right. Okay, we'll see. You know, it's like I'm gonna give you a million dollars tomorrow. Now we're talking.

Yes, let's go. You know, but I don't believe you if you say it's in two years, even though a computer would be like, great, we're getting two million dollars. This is awesome. You know, it would understand a number is a number.

And, you know, we didn't know we were getting it anyway. We knew, you know, we plan to live the next two years of our life without it anyway. Who cares? But it's all the stories we tell ourselves that I don't trust people.

This is what people do. You know, he could be hit by a bus tomorrow. Um, but none of it is based in fact. So you may say, like, well, what does that have to do with CS?

If you're saying you got to pay all these people, they're gonna be talking to your clients, and all that's gonna happen is that they're gonna keep using your product, which you think is gonna happen anyway, that's a tough sell. And and to be like, uh, you know, and now they're like, oh, you should be upselling, that's what you're here for. And it's like, no, it's not. Um, it's like that can be a result, you know, it's like once once they've reached their goals with your product, once they got what they came for, I take all the jargon out of it, once they got what they came for and you've proven that you do what you say and that they're getting value out of it.

Then when you say, Okay, because I know you, I know the value you've gotten out of this, I know what your business does, other people like you, then move on to this because it gives them this other value, and here's what it does for them. So that's where upsells can become easier. But you can't just go in and be like, hi, want to buy more? It's like, no.

And most CSMs don't even want to do that because they got into this because they did not want to be in sales. SPEAKER_02: True. SPEAKER_01: Sales is easier, there's more glory, but you have to be okay with doing sales and enjoy doing sales, and I'm fine with it, honestly. Um, I've had to become fine with it, but I would much rather um be out there helping people than trying to sell them on something.

What I've had to do is understand the way that what I'm selling them is going to help them. And that by if I don't get them to understand that, I'm doing them a disservice because I am leaving them to get hurt in some way. But you really have to believe in your product for that. SPEAKER_02: 100%.

Yeah, if you don't believe in your product, you're it's hard to sell. And it goes back to it's and this is interesting because it's funny um when you mention about like CS wants to go to CS because they don't want to sell, and then arguably salespeople, yes, you have to deal with a lot of rejection, you know, and that uncertainty, but at the end of the day, they don't have to keep a relationship post-sale. That's it, it's done, you know, in most cases, unless they're full cycle.

But um, it and it's it's a common misconception, in my opinion, because you said it yourself, you do need to sell the value, right? Like sell them and train it. Like, how is it going to help them? And that's an element of selling.

It also goes back to the element of psychology as well. Oh, yeah, which is also interesting. And you brought up about actually tap into that a little bit more because you're talking about like essentially you going, and this is back to the C-suite example about like, hey, focusing on the negative in a lot of cases, like, what are they missing out on? And I think like that, I forget the exact comment, uh um um what's the word I'm looking for?

Um, concept. Sorry. SPEAKER_01: Loss aversion. SPEAKER_02: Loss aversion, exactly.

And it's like, okay, like how our brains work now you could apply that to CS. I'm curious, like, where have you seen that be successful from like an adoption or onboarding perspective? I have I've seen some examples as well where I'll say, like, hey, here's we're to companies where it's like, here's what your competitors are doing or using, and and that's picked up like, oh my god, I'm missing out on. I can't keep keep up to date on what you know you name your ABC company that I'm competing with.

But like I'm curious from your perspective, like how that's been successful using the you know, that concept. SPEAKER_01: Uh they're very different. Um, whether you're doing the concepts are very different, whether you're doing onboarding or retention. Um, for onboarding, you don't really use loss aversion much in onboarding.

Onboarding is more about dopamine, um, which is the happy hormone that you get when you play with your phone and why you can't put it down. Um it's and dopamine is not about receiving something pleasurable, it's about the anticipation of knowing you're about to. That's what dopamine is. Um, so it's actually the anticipation of the payoff that you're addicted to.

That's why people get addicted to gambling and things like that, because it's like, and that's why variable rewards work so well on us. Um you'd think it would be the reward, but no, it's like the I don't know, it's exciting. I think it's gonna be it. Uh so just the way the way hormones combine and the the way they affect our brain.

So that's something you can leverage because like we don't want to be going in negative when we're just meeting people. Um, it's like when you're gonna leave me, I'm gonna go negative. Um, but when you're just meeting people and you want to get them on board, that's what we're doing, onboarding, not checklisting, right? SPEAKER_00: Right.

SPEAKER_01: They are not on board until they've achieved an initial value. Doesn't have to be the whole thing, but they have to be like, oh, I see how this is gonna work and get me what I came for. Okay, all right. Show me what you gotta show me.

I'm in. Um, like now I'll do the work that is required on my end to get what I came for. Now I will go to the goddamn gym. Um so, and the way that you do that is um actually by the science of uh, you know, we get a lot of science of how you implement habits.

So that is making it tiny, bite-sized, easy. People have to associate this with like it's so easy and it's a quick win, right? That's gonna harness that dopamine, right? It's like, oh, because you know what, we don't get enough gold stars in our life.

And I don't know about you, but like I would like a little credit, you know. I brushed my teeth this morning. I didn't have to do that. No.

Um, but but it's more just like, you know, a lot of us, especially as adults, we're doing a lot of things for other people that gets no recognition. And if we disappeared, it would be felt. Um, and we know it's kind of like, yeah, you tacitly agreed to this um because it's your job, because you had kids, because you this, that. Um, that doesn't mean that it doesn't feel really good to be acknowledged.

And we're starved for it. So when we tell a customer, like, all you have to do, don't worry about anything else, go in there, push this button, and here's why. Here's the benefit that you're gonna get long term from it. You know, you have to tie it to a reason, not just like push the button dummy.

Um, right. But like that's gonna start the process of doing this without your ever having to touch it. You know? So now it's I've got a reason.

I go in, they go push the button. You do something that acknowledges what they did and and makes them feel special and like they've accomplished something. And it doesn't have to be a huge thing. It you'll see sometimes like little star animations, little confetti, whatever, that triggers dopamine.

That's like, oh, something good happened. I did something good. And they're associating that with the action they just took. So you want to anchor a positive emotion.

Tiny steps, stupid easy, positive emotion. That's sort of the the perfect formula. Um, you know, a friend was trying to teach me to make dinner every night and uh, you know, because I can cook like crazy. It's I don't want to.

And she's like, all you have to do, she's like, you have to come home, take the knife out of the knife block, put it down, and smile and go, yeah. Uh, and like pump your fist and do like a big smile. And I was like, I'm gonna look like a crazy person. And she's like, you are a crazy person, go do it.

Uh and I did, and it really did for a long time lead me to to cook every night until it became impractical for my life. But like that was the step. It wasn't like go get a chicken, defrost it, cut it up, you know, preheat the oven, do the like I don't wanna know. But like if I get a win from taking a knife out of a block, you know, and my brain sees it as like, yeah, you did it, you accomplished all you had to do for this today.

You win. So there are ways to do this with software, you know, and and little animations like that. You know, you can also send an email that's just like, way to go, you achieve step one, or like you've hit level one. That's why there's all that gamification.

Um, yes. I don't love to rely on that because it requires your product and engineers to to build it and they don't wanna. Um but you know, there are plugins, there are all sorts of things, but even just like a little email that sends like a poof of confetti, it's like you've hit level one. Um and you did it, and congratulations, you know, now you're this close to the next level, all you have to do.

So gamifying, building that anticipation. Um and again, just always tying it back to here's why you're gonna do this next thing. Here's how it has to do with everything, because that's respect, you know? Whether you're asking someone who works for you or you're asking a client, you got to tell them why.

Because if you don't, it's just like no, you do it. I don't want to see the point, you know. There are constantly like I I tend to say like 27 things on someone's to-do list for today. Today.

SPEAKER_02: Of course. SPEAKER_01: And if you're not at the top, you're at the bottom. Because that's the 27 things they plan for, not the stuff that's coming in the door that they now have to handle, right? So you have to be so tied to their survival at their job.

This is a another big tip tip that I teach. It's it's not how can I get them to get the business value out of their software? How can I get this person that I am talking to right here that I've got to get on board? How can I get them promoted?

SPEAKER_02: Exactly. Right? So true. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: How do you make them look like the hero? Yeah. How do I make you look good to your boss? That is my goal here, you know.

So your boss has asked you to do this, why? What is it going to show them? And if they're like, I don't know, my boss doesn't tell me these things. Well, um, generally, most companies are trying to do one of four things at all times.

Um and they're, you know, mostly related to having more money than they did before, but it's uh make money, save money, increase productivity, which means they're spending less money on people, uh, or increase security. And that's just like because security breaches are expensive. Um yeah. That is a limited bucket.

We handle that a little bit differently. Really cool psychological levers to pull there, but for most of the people, it's the revenue, the productivity. Um so you want to show them all right, this is how much productivity you are going to save with this. If you do what I'm saying, you're gonna implement this and you are going to be responsible for this much productivity.

Now wait, tie it to the salaries of the people who perform this. How often do they perform this task? How many of them are there? You know, and do that math equation.

And I suck at math and I could do this. Do that math equation. And all of a sudden you're able to say, I implemented X software and saved us, you know,$250,000 in lost productivity or in person hours. Um, it decreased our margins by X percent, um, you know, or increased our profit margins by X percent.

Uh so again, using the language that they care about, right? Because even if your boss is not in the C-suite, they very well may not be. But if they say those words to their boss, they're still gonna be like, it's gonna sound good if I say that and say my team did it. Um yeah, of course.

You know, so when you're when you're socializing that up, be like, this is what this did for our team. Like, and you can go ahead and like run that up the chain and be like, our department did this. You know, don't don't be afraid to give like to give some of the credit away. But this is how you get promoted.

This is how you get seen as like, oh, they're strategic. Look at what they did for me. Um, that's how you show that you are a strategic part of the business, not somebody who implements a software, but somebody who is really thinking about the big picture. SPEAKER_02: 100%.

Yeah, and I think it's I think the key thing here, and I see this happen a lot of times when you know, especially like when CSMs are, you know, developing EBRs or QBRs, whatever we're calling it nowadays, but like they're just focused on usage. And it's just it's like how what is your actual yeah, what's your impact for the business? I remember during my even my times, uh, I used to be at a research company, uh, eMarketer, and and again, it's you had to do a lot of qualitative fact finding in order to it's like, yeah, you could show that, like, hey, making sure that people are using it, that's fine and dandy.

But at the end of the day, there are some companies that have a couple of seats and they're using it just for one quarterly report. What mattered in that report that helped their business? And that's get telling that story. A hundred percent.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah. And that would be a really crummy EBR if you were just like, you pulled one report. SPEAKER_02: Yep. SPEAKER_01: Yay!

SPEAKER_02: Exactly. And then on the flip side, too, it's like, uh, oh, well, that that company gets that value out of that report, and then you're thinking, oh wow, they're incredibly unhealthy because you know, for whatever reason that they don't seem like they're using that. SPEAKER_01: By your standards. Like, and this is something I see all the time.

It's like, well, we have to make sure they're using all of the product. It's like, no, you don't. What are they trying to do? Are they using the product in the way that they're, you know, that's gonna get them that?

Start with that. Don't try and have them use the whole thing. You're gonna overwhelm them. Don't give me a personal trainer on the first day who's going to make me exercise till I throw up.

Tell him to make me do, you know, one to lift one pound one time and tell me I'm a rock star and I'm coming back tomorrow. Um, but you know, you see how that works? It's like you don't need the whole thing at once. You can add that over time, but throwing everything at someone, we think it's like, look how cool, look at all the stuff you could do.

You never have to leave this. And it's like, I have other programs. I'm already doing this. I am not migrating over.

Um it's like, can you do can you just show me what to do? Now I'm confused. Now I've seen 30 things. Um, like, start, what do you want to do?

All right, I'm gonna teach you that. Just that. There's other stuff in the future. You want to pre-pave, what I call pre-paving.

Um so it's like, you know, this this is what you want to learn. This is what we're gonna do. Uh it's gonna take three steps. Now, when you get to about 75% of the way there, you know, when we can see that it's that it's right there and it's gonna happen, that's when we're gonna want to start talking about X feature because that's what people then jump to next to make it to that next level.

Um, just so I want you to be aware of that so you don't lose momentum, right? SPEAKER_00: Right. For sure. SPEAKER_01: That is much different than them getting there and being like, hey, you want to buy this now?

unknown: Yeah. SPEAKER_01: Lots of people use it. Um, so it's like, I'm not even selling this. It's like, but we're not gonna talk about that today.

We're gonna talk to you about doing XYZ is how you get that result. Um, made it simpler. So that way, when I then in future say, like, hey, we're at 75%. Can you believe it's time to start talking about that?

You did it. That is a symbol of their accomplishment, not you trying to sell something. SPEAKER_02: Exactly. No, 100%.

Let them kind of grow into the product based on their business outcomes. SPEAKER_01: Yeah. SPEAKER_02: That's it. SPEAKER_01: Well, they're not using this part of the product.

Like, because it doesn't apply to them. That's okay. Like, you don't have to use every bit of it. I get that it makes it stickier, but do one thing right and they're gonna keep you.

Like, that's that's what they bought you for. Like, it actually drives me crazy. I understand why companies are trying to do everything now because you know they're afraid that you're gonna that you're gonna migrate to something that does everything. But I find when you do when you do that, the companies that quote unquote do everything, they don't do any of it well, you know?

SPEAKER_02: Well, that's it's tricky. Yeah, 100%. SPEAKER_01: So focus on what can get the actual job done first. You can't you can't prevent your company from trying to develop every single function under the sun, but you can keep your customers focused on what they care about.

SPEAKER_02: For sure. No, I think this is uh some good takeaways here. I think um, you know, kind of focusing on those outcomes and also, you know, taking a step back and not overwhelming the customer can have a pretty big impact, but also focusing on the on the actual goal. And again, I think like something that's not spoken about enough, you know, we went a lot of different ways, but like make them make the customer look like the hero because I think that's gonna really get them bought in and it kind of goes back to kind of full circle, right?

Like, what does it goes back to the C-suite? What do they care about? What is your what is your um, you know, your key persona within your platform? What do they care about?

Same thing applies, and it all wraps up to the psychology and the self interest, and it's in uh in CS Leadership Academy. SPEAKER_01: I tell people like, if you remember one thing from this course, you're gonna hear me say it so many times, and you're gonna get sick of it. Uh, it's what's in it for me? Why do I care?

Why do I care? You know, and I will I will say this to people. I will be a jerk. Uh, you know, they'll they'll be talking about something they're trying to explain to their executives.

I'm like, why do I care? Uh damn it. I'm like, well, you should care because it's your business. I'm like, yeah, but I don't.

SPEAKER_00: Yep. SPEAKER_01: Uh and you know, you'll see if you look at my LinkedIn, um, half the time, so many of the comments are just like, whiff them. Like, what's in it for me? Like, or why do I care?

And like, people are not being rude to me. They're like doing a callback. Um but that really is, you know, I have all these nuanced ways of going about it, but it really does come back to that. Why does this specific person care lead with that sentence?

Because I promise you, it's gonna fall out of your brain. You're gonna go in there with a great plan, being like, I'm gonna focus on this, and they're gonna care, and then we're gonna transition to this. No, it's all gonna fall out of your head because your brain is gonna hijack it, being like, Yeah, but we need this. So, what I actually advocate for, very practical tip get post-its.

Anyone you're meeting with, same day or day before you need it in advance. The first sentence, just like, hey, I was thinking about something that could benefit you in X way, you know, like what do they care about that could increase your sales or could make closing sales easier for you? Um, this is me trying to get someone to sell to ICP clients more. Like, I thought of something that could make selling and closing so much easier for you.

Um, I actually have like a um like a story bank and a diagram of what stories work best with what type of customers. Like uh, you know, here were their pain points, here's what it's like after they're using our software, here's what they say they love, here's what they don't have to do anymore. Um, you know, and if you use that, if you use their exact language, it will have instant resonance. Now, as a salesperson or marketing, they're like, yeah, please give me that.

And that's like a positive loop that just you know starts to run because it's gonna be easier to close the ideal clients, right? Versus um, can you stop selling to those people? Like they hate it, they're screwing me up, I can't possibly hit my numbers. They're like, Yeah, but I gotta hit my numbers, you know, like exactly.

But if you make it so that they can hit their numbers faster, um, and if you're not sure, like how does this tie to that, how could this possibly benefit them? Uh ask Chat GPT. It's great. You know, I can make a lot of uh kind of obscure connections, but if uh if your brain power is low that day, you know, just ask it, you know, and you can go through a few iterations.

But that's one of those things that's been so helpful. I had to do that all on my own brain power before. SPEAKER_02: It's so true. It's it's actually incredible, like when you're in kind of like this like brain fog or blog, like writer's block or whatever it is, how much it could help you for sure.

SPEAKER_01: This week, this week has just been my brain's like, we're off. It's Thanksgiving week. And I'm like, no, but we're not yet. And we're trying to fit an entire week into three days.

Uh it's like, nope, nope, I'm done. Please go play with your phone. Uh yeah. I'm just like, all right.

SPEAKER_02: It's so true. Um, you know, and and while we're coming we're coming to an end here, like in terms of wrapping up, you have you have a lot of knowledge on you know, uh on the psychology piece. And I think it's something that we don't talk a lot about in the show. I did have uh Rob Zambido on the on the show.

He talked a little bit about it as well in concept. Great guy. SPEAKER_01: He's on my path. Like we are we are two sides of the the same coin.

He's like my brain twin. Uh and the nicest man, too. Like, just sweetheart, brilliant. Love talking to him.

He's so smart. SPEAKER_02: Oh, for sure. He's a good time and lots of great knowledge too. And I guess like I and I can't even remember, you know, unfortunately, like the books he recommended or like learnings, but I'm curious as far as like where you've gone to learn, like the non-traditional learning, right?

Like anything you recommend, podcasts, books, anything of that nature, kind of for the audience to kind of tap into. SPEAKER_01: Yeah. Um, you know, this isn't something that I think I've mentioned before on podcasts, but that is having started my own business, I had to learn marketing. I didn't know anything about marketing.

And marketing is all psychology, like content marketing. Um, learning about, you know, direct, like direct sales and content marketing. That's what teaches you about how to speak to people about why they should care. And you have to do this just as much when someone is a customer as when you are selling to them.

It really teaches you the what's in it for me. So um, I've learned a lot from James Wedmore and the Mind Your Business podcast. Um, I've learned a lot from um books on neurolinguistic. It's too smart for me.

I can't use it, but I kind of understand it and it's just neat to think about. Um I've also just learned a ton about how the brain works because I'm fascinated. Um and I I hope this makes people feel better. I didn't do this because I'm such a smarty pants.

I did it because I wanted to be less of a weirdo. I was such a weirdo growing up that I was like, I'm gonna I just gotta learn more about psychology. Like, why are people doing these things? Then maybe I can try and look normal.

And it worked. Uh, you all think I'm normal. Uh but you know, that's what really got me into it because like we don't make sense. The stuff, me too, the stuff we do does not make sense.

It's against our own interests a lot of the time. So uh thinking fast and slow, uh, Daniel Kahneman. Um, it's it's a thick book, you know. If you want, if you want something a little more chill that will still get you the idea, uh Blink by Malcolm Gladwell is a good one.

Um and I really like uh Robert Cialdini's influence. Um really, really useful. I do have a page um on my website, Provansuccess.com.

If you go to the resources, I have all the books I recommend because I am a huge uh book nerd as well. But I do it all on audio at this point because uh my children consider my cracking open a book an act of war. Uh so anything that's on there is probably gonna be really good on audio because I can't take it if it's not. Uh the one other one I'm gonna recommend just because it is one of my absolute favorites, is never split the difference, which yeah, everyone loves that, right?

And the funny thing is, like, I'm such a split the difference person. Uh like I wanna, I wanna get along, I wanna make it a win for everyone, but it really is so CS coded. Um, you think it's gonna, you're like, oh, an FBI hostage negotiator, this is gonna be so bro and so alpha, and so I'm a tough guy, and you got to listen to me. And I thought I was gonna hate it.

And it's the exact opposite. And it's about leveraging your empathy, but in a way that's actually productive in business. So really cool, really fun, amazing on audio. SPEAKER_02: 100%.

Yeah. Speaking of audio on that fact, for for Chris Voss, loved his uh, it's like the one thing I've I loved about like Masterclass. If you ever subscribe to the Masterclass series, his uh his whole video series on the art of negotiation, great one too. And a lot, a lot of pieces, obviously from you know, never split the difference, but um but good stuff.

We'll definitely include those links in the description so that way people could kind of you know dive into whatever they want to dive into first. But um, but other than that, no, obviously, like Pro Van Success, they could find you on there on your website directly, but where else can everybody find you, Rachel? SPEAKER_01: Um, Provan Success.com is like the most direct, you'll be able to find everything there.

I also have my own podcast called Psychology of Customer Success. A little bit on the nose, but easy to remember. Um, and you can find me on LinkedIn. They haven't really been pushing my stuff very much lately.

So I promise you I do post all the time. So you might have to turn the notifications on to know about it. Uh but you can always sign up for my newsletter. I give, you know, under five minute psych tips for better leadership and and CS uh CS work as well.

Um, those are those are the main ways to search me out. SPEAKER_02: Awesome. No, good stuff. Well, definitely can relate to the LinkedIn algorithm challenges, but 100% definitely encourage everybody to you know, click the bell or whatever it is.

SPEAKER_01: Get on my list. It's really the only way you're gonna know I exist. Yeah. SPEAKER_02: 100%.

Well, good stuff. Well, Rachel, thanks so much for coming on on the show. Great conversations, um, you know, and looking forward for everyone, you know, to taking the wealth of knowledge from you. So thanks so much for coming on.

SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for having me. I loved running my mouth about this. It's always fun for me to talk about and have people who actually want to hear me say it rather than like my husband and my best friend who are like, Jesus Christ, we know. SPEAKER_02: No, I totally get it for sure.

No, always always happy to talk shop, you know. I'm sure to everyone listening too. Awesome. Well, thanks, Rachel.

SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much. SPEAKER_02: That's a wrap for today's episode. Thanks so much for listening. If you got some value from this conversation, hit subscribe, leave a rating or review, and share it with someone who's also out there trying to build a better customer success or go-to-market strategy, even if it's messy along the way.

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