Welcome to the Nearbound Daily Newsletter—the #1 partnerships newsletter in the world keeping thousands of partner professionals on top of the latest industry principles, tactics, and trends. nearbound.com is a project of Reveal. Join the movement here. And ask NearBOT a question here.

PRINCIPLES

It’s way too easy to settle for good

Jim Collins, in his landmark book, Good to Great, shared,

“Good is the enemy of great. And that is one of the key reasons why we have so little that becomes great.

We don’t have great schools, principally because we have good schools. We don’t have great government, principally because we have good government.

 

Few people attain great lives, in large part because it is just so easy to settle for a good life.”

Good customer success is why we don’t have great customer success.

Good customer success = Fighting fires

Great customer success = Delivering outcomes

Good customer success = "Keeping customers happy"

Great customer success = Keeping customers successful

Great customer success is a company endeavor.

Every department from Product to Marketing to Sales to Success must all work together to help customers achieve their goals.

TACTICS

3 pillars of nearbound customer success

CSMs are so busy mitigating risk, they’re not helping customers reach their promised land.

CSMs spend most days managing accounts, fielding requests, and responding to DMs and emails.

But often, these things don’t create new value for a customer.

Rewind to Mark Kosoglow and Kevin Chui’s session at the Summit where they made this point clear,

"Instead of value creation, CSMs are project managing in attempts to ’keep customers happy...’
 

 

’Happy’ customers aren’t the goal. Successful customers are the goal.

 

You can’t stop creating value for your customers. The minute you do, they become at-risk…even if you’re still project managing that account well.”

That’s why alignment between partnerships and customer success is so important.

Partner Managers can help CS teams find and unlock value for customers.

A few examples include:

• Integrations: Create end-to-end solutions for your partners’ problems using partners.

• Support: Connect customers with agency partners who can help them with first-rate implementation.

• Education: Map the tech in your customers’ stack, partner with those companies, and show customers how to get the most from both products.

The more you drive success for your customers, the more they’ll trust you, and the less likely they are to churn.

Here are 3 pillars of a successful CS department in the nearbound era.

1) Partnerships x CS rhythm of business

Partnership teams act as the glue between every department and successful customer outcomes. The critical ingredient is what Jared Fuller calls the Rhythm of Business. Partner Managers must meet with every department to align on projects, calendars, and goals. 

So, here’s what you have to make sure you do:

• Set up a meeting with your CS team.

• Ask about their calendar, projects, and goals (weekly, monthly, quarterly, annually).

• Figure out how to overlay partners onto their current cadences so that instead of adding work, you make driving outcomes easier.

2) Partner on every initiative

In the nearbound era, companies should never do things alone. Whether it’s marketing material or enablement, a partner should be included in every initiative to amplify your message and reach. Know exactly which partners to partner with at every stage.

3) Think in terms of value creation, not risk-mitigation

CSMs know the customer in and out. They know exactly what customers want, and how to create more value for customers, but unless someone on the leadership team stresses the importance of value creation, they get stuck in the chaos of project managing.

A successful CS department in the nearbound era acts as a customer champion and directs all activity toward value creation.

Read more about nearbound and Customer Success.

TREND

Metadata kills their CS team?!

Metadata recently decided to remove its Customer Success team from its org chart.

Instead, they’re creating a Marketing Services team that will focus only on customers.

This new team is formed by marketing experts who know the ins and outs of Metadata and have been to their customers’ promised land.

This decision validates the nearbound mindset.

Companies that will succeed in this era of connectivity and partner ecosystems will put customers first, and lean on the expertise of those who have already succeeded in getting to the promised land.

Logan Neveau explained,

“The Marketing Services team understands the lives of our customers. They’ve walked 10 miles in their shoes—they understand all of the pressures, demands, and internal obstacles marketers need to overcome in order to run best-in-class campaigns.

Learn more about Metadata’s Strategic Marketing Services team here.

UPCOMING EVENT

We like happy customers 😁

Join us on June 4th at 11:30 ET / 6:30 CET for the Happy Customers Festival!

It’s a free virtual experience to help you manage every part of your customer journey directly within HubSpot.

Every session will demonstrate practical, hands-on, HubSpot integration workflows to power each GTM function:

• Marketing—led by Wistia and Reveal.

• Sales—led by Aircall, Grain, and PandaDoc.

• Customer Success—led by Arrows and HubSpot

Register now at ilovehappycustomers.com.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Stuff you don’t want to miss!

• TODAY—May 9th—Build or Let Build? Master Integrations—Join Nick Valluri (Dropbox & Coda) and Franz-Josef Schrepf (Hopin) to discuss how Nick builds integrations and partnerships with some of the world’s largest companies, including Microsoft and Nvidia. Register here.

• May 15th—How to Partner with AWS—Join Aaron Verstraete (Vice President of Strategic Alliances at Forethought) and Scott Pollack (CEO at Firneo) where they will share insider insights on navigating the AWS ecosystem, ensuring you leave with actionable knowledge. Register here.

• May 30th—Driving Revenue Through Technology Partners—Learn from Kelly Sarabyn (Head of Product Partnerships Advocacy and Enablement at HubSpot), Asher Matthew (CEO at Partnership Leaders), and Robbie Ptaszynski (Director of Strategic Pursuits and Priority ISV Co-sell at Microsoft) as they discuss the revenue impact partnerships teams can have and evolving from re-selling to co-selling. Register here.

• Nearbound Summit 2023 Recordings—The future of GTM is nearbound. Watch the recordings to hear how B2B leaders across departments unite with Nearbound strategies and tactics. Listen here.

You’re all caught up.

RECENTLY PUBLISHED ON NEARBOUND.COM

• Rhythm of Business Checklist by Jared Fuller

• Marketo x Drift Alliance: How I Generated HUNDREDS of Referrals in ONE Month by Jared Fuller

• Chapter 2: Nearbound Defined by Jared Fuller

• What I Learned at Golden Hour (And Why It All Points to Nearbound) by Shawnie Hamer

• Nearbound and the Rhythm of Business by Jared Fuller

• How Pigment Increased Win Rates 5-10% with a Nearbound Overlay & Reveal by Shawnie Hamer

• How to use Reveal for Co-marketing Events

• Unleashing the Power of Nearbound: The Stats You Need to Know by Andrea Vallejo

• Oneflow Sees a 190% Surge In Created Opportunities After Beginning 2-Way Data Sharing with HubSpot with Johan Jansson

• Howdy Partners #72: Psychology of Team-Wide Buy-In—The Answer to Partner Program Success with Maurits Pieper

• Nearbound Podcast #161: 3 Things You Need to Know: Attribution Crisis, Early Majority, and the Consolidation of Tech with AI

• A Deep Dive Into the Nearbound Book, With Mike Midgley, Part 3

• Mastering the Nearbound Rhythm of the Business: Key Takeaways from the Nearbound Book by Andrea Vallejo

   

   

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See you tomorrow

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