We’ve launched a new team: Customer Success!
We pride ourselves as a customer-centric organisation and place our customers at the heart of everything we do, from product development to the services we provide.
This, combined with valuable feedback from our customer base, has led us on a journey that’s resulted in a new department: Customer Success.
The Customer Success team is non-revenue focused and is solely focused on the customer experience, which includes building great relationships with our customers and helping to set out goals and expectations that can be achieved using our products and services.
As this department takes shape during 2022, we’re excited to be setting out on this journey with our customers and welcome feedback along the way.
This blog outlines the roles and responsibilities of our new team, along with a summary of what can be expected of this service.
The role of a Customer Success Manager
With a proactive approach to understanding our customer’s business requirements and how our products are used day-to-day, the role of a Customer Success Manager (CSM) is to develop expert knowledge of our customers.
Working closely with Account Management, Support and Products, the Customer Success team is the voice of the customer and acts as a facilitator by bringing all the relevant people together to resolve an issue or answer an important question.
Our CSMs are present for the full customer lifecycle and are responsible for helping to onboard new customers, deliver training on our products and build success plans for their dedicated customer accounts to ensure a value-driven partnership is in place.
Welcome to the team
Our team is made up of some familiar faces at Kinetic…
The immediate benefits of onboarding existing team members at Kinetic into Customer Success is the level of product and customer knowledge already in place.
Our team have experience across multiple departments, including Support and Professional Services.
Romy Burgess - Head of Customer Success
“Following my recent promotion to Head of Customer Success with the opportunity to build a new department with a key focus on our customer experience, I’m so excited to go on this journey with Sharon and Laura and of course, our fantastic customers.”
Pictured here with Kipper, Romy joined the company in 2015 starting her career in the Support team, where she built an understanding of the challenges our products helped to address and an in-depth knowledge of the Higher Education industry.
Romy has since delivered training on our Room Service product and has managed projects for both new and existing customers. Since 2019 Romy has been managing all Room Service accounts.
Sharon Sumner - Customer Success Manager
“Over the past 20 years, I’ve always demonstrated a real passion for caring for our customers. I am very excited to now be a part of the Customer Success Team where my industry and product knowledge can really make a difference to our customer's journey.”
Many of our customers will recognise Sharon and her adorable cat Simba – Simba even has her own Instagram account!
Sharon has been with Kinetic for 20 years and has built a reputation with our customers as a truly dependable member of the team who can be counted on to “get things done”.
As lead trainer for our Commercial product set, Sharon is an expert in her field and is passionate about providing an excellent level of customer service.
Laura Henderson - Customer Success Manager
“Being part of the Customer Success Team will allow me to refine the strong relationships I've developed with colleagues and customers since joining Kinetic, to ensure we provide the best customer service and help our customers achieve their business goals with our products.”
Pictured here with her French Bulldog Pig, Laura has a breadth of knowledge of our customers in the HE industry and how our products are used day-to-day.
With roots in the Support team and more recently in training customers on our products, Laura is known for building strong working relationships both internally and externally and is always looking for new opportunities to improve the customer service we provide.
Who will receive this service?
This service is available to customers in the UK and Europe who are on a fair price contract with Kinetic.
Our department will continue to grow and develop, with a view to onboarding more customers in the future.
We are not targeting any specific contacts within each organisation, instead we are seeking opportunities to connect with individuals who can take ownership and guide the relationship forward, whether that be a contact in IT, Events, Accommodation, etc.
When will all eligible customers be assigned a CSM?
We’re in the process of assigning all eligible customers this service and will be in touch in by the end of July to introduce each customer to their new CSM.
Each CSM will reach out to each of their customer accounts individually to establish meeting frequency and the main goals/aims of the partnership.
Each customer will still have an Account Manager to provide strategic advice and guidance on business growth and new product features or modules available, and the Support team for day-to-day queries or product issues.
The future of Customer Success?
By building a department solely focused on the customer experience and the services we provide, we are committed to providing a consistently high level of customer service and opportunities for our customers to feedback on experiences.
This includes a review of our overall customer journey and the touchpoints we have with you at present, to identify where improvements can be made.
Such changes will not only impact customers on our fair price contracts who have a CSM, but all of our customer base.
We are planning to roll out regular customer surveys in the near future, thus ensuring there are ample opportunities to voice ideas or suggestions about Kinetic’s products or services.
Thank you for taking the time to read this article, we’re excited to be embarking upon the next phase of this journey and will share more updates over the coming months.
Interested in finding out more about the new Customer Success team? Please take a look at our website for more information and how to get in touch.