- Team size
- Customer interaction needs (High vs Low-touch customer service)
- Fundraising Stage
It also equips you with key job descriptions and resources to prepare CS hiring interviews and processes.
Choosing your team size based on your company size
The Serena SaaS 2023 Report indicates that between 10-12% of your total number of FTEs should be part of the CS team. This figure remains stable across growth stages; your CS team should grow at the same pace as your overall team.
Understanding the roles and positions in a CS team
Roles
Source: CS Organization - Churnzero 2023
Positions
- Vice President of Customer Success: Manages the customer success team by overseeing strategy implementation and development.
- Chief Customer Officer: Creates training programs for employees to implement customer success strategies.
- Customer Success Director: Specializes in customer relations, analyzes customer data to recognize trends and identify customer needs.
- Customer Success Management Team Lead: Develops and tracks metrics for both customer and team success.
- Customer Success Operations Manager: Studies workflows, develops strategies to improve them, and aims to enhance the efficiency of customer success.
- Digital/Engineer Success Manager: Maintains customer success software and other virtual aspects.
- Customer Success Analyst: Interprets customer data to discover trends, works closely with customer success managers to create strategies.
- Customer Success Manager: Handles one-on-one communication with customers and builds relationships.
Source: 8 Key Roles in a Customer Success Team Structure - Indeed 2023
Related Resource: Customer Success Skills - Churnzero 2021
Crafting your CS team based on customer interaction needs
Here are some examples of how Low & High touch startups can be structured and evolve.
Low-touch startup
Scaling, Low-touch startup
High-touch startup
Scaling, High-touch startup
Source: How To Structure A Customer Success Team - CustomerFacing.Io
Crafting your CS team based on your growth stage
Example on how David Sacks (U.S) structures CS teams in SaaS companies of different stages.
Series A (50 FTEs)
- Director, Customer Success Management (9 FTEs)
- CSM Enterprise (2 FTEs)
- CSM Mid-Market (2 FTEs)
- Implementation / Solutions or Sales Engineer (1-2 FTEs)
- Support Rep (1-2 FTEs)
Series B (125 FTEs)
- VP, CSM (19 FTEs)
- CSM Enterprise (6 FTEs)
- CSM SMB & MM (5 FTEs)
- Director, Implementation / Solutions, plus 2 solutions or sales engineers (3 FTEs)
- Director, Customer Support, plus 3 CS reps (4 FTEs)
Source: Bottom Up by David Sacks
Additional resources
🗨️ XAnge’s Portfolio CS Organization Talk + Resources + Case Studies
🤝 Arrows CS Hiring Support (Interview Questions, Cases)
🎯 Arrows The Startup CEO’s Guide to Customer Success and Onboarding
