SaaStr · 2013-03-04 · 4839d

Building an Effective Customer Success Team: Hiring Strategy and Performance Metrics

This article outlines best practices for building a Customer Success team in SaaS companies, emphasizing early hiring and measurement-driven goals. The author argues that Customer Success managers are critical to revenue growth, managing approximately 75% of company revenue through retention and upsells, and should be evaluated on renewal rates and net revenue growth rather than soft metrics like NPS.

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Metrics in this report

Average SaaS Renewal Rate

80-90%

median range

most SaaS companies on base revenue

Customer Success Manager to ARR Ratio

1 CSM per $2MARR

rough metric

typical SaaS company staffing

Customer Success and Support Budget

10%%

of existing revenue

post-initial traction SaaS companies

Enterprise Customer Renewal Rate

95+%

target minimum

largest enterprise customers

Net Annual Revenue Growth Rate from Existing Customers

110-120%

typical target

including churn and upsells

Small Business Customer Renewal Rate

60-70%

typical range

very small business segment