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John Brunkard

AMA: Adobe Head of Customer Success (Asia), John Brunkard on Customer Success / Sales Alignment

December 10 @ 10:00AM PT
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Which tools or integrations best support Sales–CS alignment (CRM, CPQ, success plan templates, handoff forms)?
John Brunkard
John Brunkard•
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Salamander Advisory Customer Success Advisor | Formerly Adobe, Sitecore, Red Hat, Symantec, Blue Coat, Intel, Dell, Dialogic • 5mo
I’m probably going to disappoint the tool junkies, but after 15+ years fixing broken Sales–CS alignment at dozens of companies, my strong opinion is this: The highest-lev...
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440 Views
2 requests
How early do you involve Customer Success in the sales cycle, and for which deal types or segments?
John Brunkard
John Brunkard•
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Salamander Advisory Customer Success Advisor | Formerly Adobe, Sitecore, Red Hat, Symantec, Blue Coat, Intel, Dell, Dialogic • 5mo
I suggest that there are two completely different playbooks depending on whether it’s an existing customer or a new logo. Existing customers (expansion / upsell / cross...
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429 Views
1 request
What change management practices have worked when shifting responsibilities between Sales and CS (e.g., moving renewals to CS)?
John Brunkard
John Brunkard•
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Salamander Advisory Customer Success Advisor | Formerly Adobe, Sitecore, Red Hat, Symantec, Blue Coat, Intel, Dell, Dialogic • 5mo
My core belief: Renewals are a shared outcome, but negotiation is a specialist skill. CS should make renewal a complete non-event through value delivery and risk removal....
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440 Views
1 request
How do you keep Sales and CS narratives (decks, ROI models, value hypotheses) consistent across the customer journey?
John Brunkard
John Brunkard•
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Salamander Advisory Customer Success Advisor | Formerly Adobe, Sitecore, Red Hat, Symantec, Blue Coat, Intel, Dell, Dialogic • 5mo
This is an interesting questions. Here some ideas to consider. Consistency starts with one rule: one single, shared, always-up-to-date library that everyone actually uses...
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368 Views
1 request
How do you define and enforce a clean handoff from Sales to CS, and what artifacts are required?
John Brunkard
John Brunkard•
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Salamander Advisory Customer Success Advisor | Formerly Adobe, Sitecore, Red Hat, Symantec, Blue Coat, Intel, Dell, Dialogic • 5mo
In my experience a clean handoff is non-negotiable. It is the single biggest predictor of Day-30 health, time-to-value, and eventual expansion.My definition of “clean”:Th...
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393 Views
1 request
How do you split ownership of upsell vs. cross-sell opportunities, and what triggers route opportunities to Sales vs. CS?
John Brunkard
John Brunkard•
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Salamander Advisory Customer Success Advisor | Formerly Adobe, Sitecore, Red Hat, Symantec, Blue Coat, Intel, Dell, Dialogic • 5mo
Simple, repeatable model I’ve used in the past. CS owns discovery & qualificationThe CSM is closest to the customer every day → they surface 70-80 % of the best ups...
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387 Views
1 request