X marks the value | Autumn Shepard

[JP] (0:00 - 0:15)

One inefficiency could be like, hey, maybe by better prioritizing, you'll be able to get more work done. But what if you're a highly efficient person who just does playing PlayStation? Now that's a very different process that needs to be settled.

[Dillon] (0:15 - 0:16)

Right? Sounds very personal.

[JP] (0:18 - 0:27)

Like we got to be like, no, no, no, no, that's not me, baby. That's not me, baby. You know what I mean?

I'm a good worker. I'm a good worker. PlayStation, only off balance.

[Dillon] (0:33 - 0:46)

All right, everybody ready? What's up, Lifers? And welcome to the Daily Standup with Lifetime Value, where we're giving you fresh new customer success ideas every single day.

I got my man, JP here. JP, do you want to say hi?

[JP] (0:47 - 0:47)

What's up, people?

[Dillon] (0:48 - 0:51)

Got my man, Rob here. Rob, do you want to say hi?

[Rob] (0:52 - 0:53)

What's up, Lifers?

[Dillon] (0:53 - 0:57)

And we've got Autumn here. Autumn, do you want to say hi?

[Autumn] (0:57 - 0:58)

Hello, hello.

[JP] (0:59 - 1:01)

You're earlier than usual.

[Dillon] (1:02 - 1:15)

Oh, wow. Oof. Dad joke, dad joke.

Rob, take notes. And I am your host. Another dad. My name is Dillon Young. Autumn, thank you so much for being here.

Would you please introduce yourself?

[Autumn] (1:15 - 1:30)

Yeah, I'm Autumn. I am located in Montreal, Quebec. I work for a startup called Revolate, where we provide opportunities for internal data sharing and data commercialization.

I've been a part of the customer success team for about two years now.

[Dillon] (1:31 - 1:32)

And is it your first CS role?

[Autumn] (1:33 - 1:38)

Absolutely not. I've been in customer success for about 10 years on and off in various roles. Awesome.

[Dillon] (1:39 - 1:52)

That changes the makeup of the entire conversation. So to set that up anyway, you know what we're doing here? We ask every single guest one question and one question only.

That is, what is on your mind when it comes to customer success? Why don't you tell us what that is, Autumn?

[Autumn] (1:53 - 2:44)

So the problem of value mapping has been on my mind lately and being able to use that as specifically an early age startup. So if you're anywhere where I was last year, when trying to build out a customer success program, when you feel like everything's on fire, you're, you're putting out issues, you're really just in a reactive mode, you're looking to find a place to start to know where to build these processes because without that, you're going to remain in that mode. My team was able to use the value mapping exercise to reduce our time in onboarding from months to weeks, even days, depending on the right team being involved, paths to success when it comes to expansion and onboarding, as well as creating champions where we partner with one of our oldest customers to deliver new functionality and expand their product opportunities.

[Dillon] (2:45 - 2:55)

Really quick tactical question. Is there a specific type of value? Is there like a methodology that you follow?

Is there like a website folks can go to that you recommend?

[Autumn] (2:56 - 3:57)

I don't know about a website, but there is a methodology that I followed and it's about three easy steps. It's first understanding the core problems that our customers were facing. So by doing that, we looked at our customers with the issues they were experiencing specifically in our platform.

So collaborating with customer support and with product, getting really holistic idea of that and then understanding your customers. Who are they? For example, we are in a B2B2C situation.

My research primarily was heavily on their consumers. So what problems they were experiencing, reading the forums, et cetera, and then understanding our products and how it addresses those issues. So with those three things, we were able to identify our quickest area to value.

So how do we do deliver value for these customers quickly? That's how we were able to reduce our onboarding time. And then what other areas support that problem or fix that problem that allowed us to understand the expansion and adoption opportunities that we had with our product.

[Dillon] (3:58 - 4:16)

One last question before I throw it over to Rob, who lit up when you said the term value mapping, but you said it reduces onboarding time. Is that, can I challenge that? Do you mean it actually reduced the time to onboard or do you mean it pulled forward time to value?

Time to first value.

[Autumn] (4:17 - 4:36)

In our situation, I feel like it did both because we were consistently in an onboarding phase because we didn't have that identified value marker. Now that we have that, our onboarding time has been reduced significantly, but we're also able to coordinate with safe product, for example, to contribute to that reduction of time.

[Dillon] (4:36 - 4:38)

Got it. Uh, Rob, why don't you jump in?

[Rob] (4:39 - 5:17)

I think this is a cool concept. I've never used the term value mapping before, but as I heard it, I was thinking through, I just came up with a five-step process of how I could implement this with a super useful and applicable.

So tell me, I would like to lean on your expertise here. I think if I were to go about this like today or tomorrow, then the steps I would go through for value mapping with the client are probably, I would start by establishing their organizational goals, like making sure that I have that in place, which I do track that currently. I track all these pieces currently, just they're all siloed and they're not really exact.

[Autumn] (5:18 - 5:18)

Yeah.

[Rob] (5:19 - 5:55)

So goals, establishment, then reestablishing and reinforcing the value propositions that our product and services bring against those goals. That's step two. Step three would be a journey map, establish a customer journey map so that we can see a timetabled view of how those values become realized.

Step four is like measuring the value realization. So putting it in a journey map is one thing, but actually measuring it and making sure that it happens is step four to me. And then step five, I think, would be iteration based on the feedback loops that you establish with your customers.

Exactly.

[Autumn] (5:56 - 6:15)

The iteration is that last step, so it's four steps, value review, goals to achieve, path to success and verified outcomes. And so you've hit the nail on the head with that, those steps are exactly it. I don't have included in my process that feedback loop, but of course that is just paramount to being able to grow and to consistently deliver value to your customers.

[Dillon] (6:16 - 6:22)

This is fun. I like this idea. JP, do you have any experience with this, whether it's called value mapping or something else?

[JP] (6:24 - 7:16)

Yeah, it looks like it's a really great, convenient way to describe something that I think I've tried to do on my own, but cannot be done on my own. It must be done with a team. So it looks like it's really cool.

Like it's an offshoot of Six Sigma, which is something that I've definitely been interested in getting certified for. It was looking at Gemba processes, being able to go and find out in a very supportive way, right? Because I never want to forget the human element is when we start talking about efficiency, that means inefficiencies get brought to light.

One inefficiency could be like, Hey, maybe by better prioritizing, you'll be able to get more work done. But what if you're a highly efficient person who just does playing PlayStation? Now that's a very different process that needs to be settled, right?

[Dillon] (7:16 - 7:17)

Sounds very personal.

[JP] (7:19 - 8:50)

Like we're going to have to be like, no, no, no, that's not me, baby. That's not me, baby. You know what I mean?

I'm a good worker. I'm a good worker. PlayStation during only off hours, but I really value the call out to value stream mapping.

I do think that it is really good to think about efficiency in the way that really we need to get together and collaborate on that sort of thing. I think that the pushback probably that happens a lot is where do we find the time to do it? That's always it.

Oh, we're a growing company. Things are moving fast. So it's always like the time when you need to do it, the most people seem to have the most resistance to doing it because they're like, I have to do all this stuff.

Like I'm in a situation where my workload is about to go over capacity temporarily until we get some new headcount. This episode comes out later, so it'll be OK. And I'm like, OK, I understand that we have to adjust our strategy.

We have to adjust our workflow temporarily because we have more accounts. What's the reality of that situation? So I really appreciate the call out because I think it's something that a lot of people, especially if they're more scaled or SMB, will appreciate because we're just constantly hearing about how, hey, you need to do this.

You need to do that. You need to advocate for this. You need to do all this.

I think there's a lot of people who are just trying to figure out how to manage ginormous books of business and have a really good workflow so that they can maybe get into doing some of that other stuff that real CSMs are supposed to be doing.

[Autumn] (8:50 - 9:32)

You know, I've been able to use the same process, not just in my work here, but a nonprofit that I volunteer for. I've even seen my husband apply this in his job as a helmet designer. So when he's trying to solve a problem with a helmet, for example, it just needs to be improved, et cetera.

He can understand the problems to be solved. Is it that it's too loud? Is it that the sun visor doesn't work?

He needs to understand who's buying it. Is it a price point of a thousand? Is it a price point of 250?

That's going to change on how you develop and then how does your product solve it? And then you collaborate with your design and engineering team in order to deliver on that. So it's something that can be applied even on a smaller scale or a larger scale, depending on where you're at.

[Dillon] (9:33 - 10:28)

It's legit. When you talk about it that way, it starts to feel more like Six Sigma. That was an interesting call out, JP.

It reminds me of this thing I say all the time, which is like, get back to basics. Like you've got to approach every problem as though it's new. You can use the same framework, Rob's favorite word, Rob Framework Zambito.

You've got to approach every problem as though it's brand new. You've got a body of work behind you. You've got a history that you can work with, but you've got to treat it like, OK, what's my problem statement?

What are the parameters within which I have to work? And then how do I solve for it? And I think so often we just don't do things that methodically.

And sometimes we need to slow down and think about it more methodically. Autumn, this is an awesome topic. I really love it.

Thank you so much for sharing it. We are out of time, but you should come back and talk about this some more at a later date. Until then, we've got to say goodbye.

[Autumn] (10:29 - 10:30)

All right. Bye bye.

[Speaker 5] (10:34 - 11:05)

You've been listening to The Daily Standup by Lifetime Value. Please note that the views expressed in these conversations are attributed only to those individuals on this recording and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of their respective employers. For all inquiries, please reach out via email to Dillon at LifetimeValueMedia.com.

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