Quick summary: As more customer success (CS) teams report to the chief revenue officer (CRO), CS leaders must adapt to a revenue-aligned structure without losing their customer-first focus. This blog offers five practical tips for navigating this shift, including aligning goals with NRR, balancing short- and long-term KPIs, clarifying roles, using purpose-built tech, and showcasing CS’s strategic value to sales. Ultimately, CS under the CRO can thrive if leaders proactively define their role in driving sustainable growth.
“Customer success needs to align with revenue.” “NRR (net revenue retention) is our north star.” “Renewals should be an outcome of good customer success.”
Any of these sound familiar? These adages have been around for years now, so it really should come as no surprise that as customer success teams have shifted away from customer satisfaction and towards driving growth, more and more CS teams are rolling up to the CRO (chief revenue officer).
According to the 2024 Customer Success Leadership Study, the number of customer success teams under the CRO jumped from 24% in 2023 to 33% in 2024.
A nine-point increase over the course of a single year is highly indicative of the prevalence and permanence of this trend. So, what does that mean for CS leaders? What new challenges come with sitting in the revenue organization, and how do you overcome them?
And, on the flip side, what value does customer success bring to their sales counterparts as part of the broader go-to-market team? The evolution of the chief customer officer and CS leadership’s expanding influence reflects just how strategic this role has become. Today’s CS leaders are expected not only to foster loyalty but to tie their efforts directly to revenue metrics that matter. Read on to find out!
1. Align CS goals with NRR to protect your “customer advisor” status.
This question has long been a major hesitation from customer success professionals about tying CS to revenue. Will the customer trust their customer success manager (CSM) if they’re more focused on dollars and cents than building a relationship with them?
Will CSMs struggle to maintain a customer-first mindset and spend all their time on upsells, rather than learning about their big picture goals and helping them navigate the path to get there?
While these concerns are not unwarranted, the goal of moving customer success under the CRO is not to turn CS into the new sales.
Sales should still sell new revenue, but CS should protect that revenue and grow it. To do so without losing customers’ trust or the role as a trusted advisor, CS leaders who roll up to the CRO should keep two things in mind:
1: Align CS goals with net revenue retention (NRR) , which shows both retention and expansion, instead of upsell/cross-sell alone. You can do this either at an individual level, where each CSM is held to an NRR goal, or if that still feels too sales-y for your taste, the goal can take the form of an aggregate across the entire CSM team.
2: Don’t lose sight of value realization metrics and the importance of a consultative approach as leading indicators of revenue goals. Use customer health scores and usage data to identify when an upsell really may be the best thing for the customer, or when it’s time to step in and handle an at-risk account.
2. Balance short-term revenue goals with long-term customer lifecycles.
Sales teams often operate on short-term quotas (e.g., quarterly revenue targets), while CS success is typically measured over longer customer lifecycles. This difference in the cadence of measurement doesn’t mean CS can’t “own” revenue, but it can be tricky to set up a structure that both feels fair to individuals and meets the needs of the revenue organization.
Moving CS to a short-term focus on renewals and expansion might lead to burnout, poor customer outcomes, and churn. Instead, define KPIs that balance short-term results with long-term customer health. Consider measurements like:
Time to onboard (TTO) and time to value (TTV)
- Formula: Number of days from onboarding to “go-live” and first business outcome
- Why it matters: Faster time to value increases stickiness and long-term retention.
Lifetime value (LTV)
- Formula: Average revenue per customer x customer lifespan
- Why it matters: Helps track total value a customer brings over time, ensuring short-term gains don’t come at the expense of long-term success.
Gross revenue retention (GRR)
- Formula: (Recurring revenue – churn) / starting revenue
- Why it matters: Measures customer retention without considering upsells, keeping the focus on maintaining long-term relationships.
3. Define who owns what to maintain role clarity and incentive alignment.
All go-to-market functions (sales, marketing, and customer success) face challenges around overlapping responsibilities in customer relationships. This can lead to confusion over who owns renewals, upsells, and proactive engagement, which can, in turn, lead to cross-functional friction, more isolated silos, and a far worse overall customer experience.
To prevent this, clearly define who owns what in the customer lifecycle.
For example, sales owns new logos, CS owns adoption and renewals, and expansion is a shared goal where CS handles simple upsells like additional licenses, add-ons, or a higher tier of the same product, but sales gets involved in any cross-sell that involves adding additional product lines.
By the way, the debate over whether customer success should own renewals is over – the answer is unequivocally yes, they should. But the best practices around upsell and cross-sell are still undecided, so each organization should hypothesize about the best structure for their unique business, product, and customers, and acknowledge that responsibilities may need to be reassigned over time, depending on outcomes.
In the same vein, if the compensation plans for sales and CS don’t incentivize these activities and behaviors by their respective team, those lines are going to remain blurry. So be sure that commissions, bonuses, or other variable compensation plans are aligned with the responsibilities and tasks you’ve outlined for each team.
4. Ensure data-driven decision making with purpose-built CS technology.
CS needs data visibility (usage data, health scores, churn risk) to make informed decisions, but sales teams tend to prioritize pipeline and revenue data.
This means that CS leaders may struggle to get access to customer usage analytics if data is siloed in different systems, or if, as part of the revenue organization, CS is being asked to use technology that was built for sales.
Where CS sits in the organization doesn’t change the need for purpose-built tools, so push for integrated, purpose-built CS platforms within the revenue tech stack.
5. Capture and communicate the value that customer success brings to sales.
Customer success under the CRO doesn’t just bring challenges, it also brings benefits, all about customer retention, expansion, and overall revenue growth. So if you’re a CS leader newly aligned to the revenue organization, don’t forget about the tremendous value your team can bring. Here are a few examples.
1. CS provides valuable customer insights.
CS knows which customers are most successful, playing a critical role in identifying a company’s ideal client profile (ICP) and helping sales and marketing refine their targeting and messaging. CSM conversations are also ripe for gathering insights from customers about why they chose (or left) a competitor, helping sales sharpen their pitch and objection handling for future opportunities.
2. CS can help sales increase upsell opportunities (if sales owns expansion).
CS teams track customer health scores, product usage, and engagement, giving sales warm, qualified leads (CSQLs). They also build trust with customers, making it easier for sales to introduce new solutions without feeling pushy. By monitoring adoption and sentiment, CS can pinpoint the right moments for upsells, leading to higher close rates.
3. CS leads to even more new customers.
Customers who value your product become case studies, referrals, and champions that help sales close more deals, and CS can provide real-world success stories that sales can use to build credibility with new prospects.
4. CS helps align sales on value-based selling.
As sales teams move from transactional to value-based selling, insights from CS can support sales teams in focusing more on customer outcomes, making deals stickier and more valuable. CS also helps sales understand which product capabilities truly drive success, leading to more effective sales pitches that are focused on the full solution, not just features. Plus, since CS monitors renewal and expansion trends, sales leadership can make more accurate revenue forecasts.
One thing is sure: CS teams under the CRO are here to stay.
Like it or not, this new organizational structure doesn’t seem to be going anywhere anytime soon.
So while CS leaders may have their fair share of challenges to face in this new revenue-driven world, don’t forget what you bring to the table. Use that to drive more expansion revenue, lower churn, more efficient onboarding, a better customer experience, stronger customer relationships, more referrals and case studies, and more predictable, sustainable revenue growth.
Marley Wagner is a freelance digital customer success consultant and fractional chief marketing officer. Her work centers on helping B2B tech companies increase revenue and accelerate growth with both prospective and existing clients through organic channels that emphasize brand reputation and trust. Read more from Marley Wagner at ChurnZero here.
