Companies that make an effort to keep their customer success and product teams in sync can make a massive difference not only in the customer experience, but also in the overall success of the company. Collaboration between these two departments makes it easier for the company to build a product with the customer in mind, and it also builds trust with customers by making them feel heard in product roadmap discussions. However, there is often some level of disconnect or room to improve communication between these two teams. 

Here are some ways that company leaders can work to improve collaboration between customer success and product teams.

Establish regular check-ins

CS and product teams need to be working together frequently to discuss customer feedback and build a plan for implementing it into the product. Regular check-ins can help the team ensure that customer pain points and needs are properly prioritized when working toward future updates and improvements. While it may seem like a simple solution, giving CS and product team members opportunities to connect frequently and build relationships will help your company as a whole work through any roadblocks more efficiently, ultimately leading to a stronger product.

Amplify the voice of the customer

CS teams talk with customers every single day, which means they have invaluable insights into the customer's experience with the product. They should be sharing this information with the product team in a digestible, informative way so that product can then use this information to boost usability, create new feature concepts, and improve functionality. With the CS team playing the customer advocacy role, your team is able to more easily amplify and respond to customer voices.

Here are some tips for how CS teams can make sure customer voices are heard and put into action during product conversations:

• Summarize the feedback: Customer feedback can be extensive, so before the meeting, it's best to simplify and highlight key points to provide the product team with an overview. This strategy helps the product team cut through the noise and enables them to prioritize more efficiently.
• Prioritize based on impact: CS and product should work together to rank product improvements based on the potential impact they will have on the customer experience. Then, the product team can focus its resources on the most significant issues first.
• Be specific: Remember, CS is the product team’s window into the customer experience. It’s important to provide specific examples to give the product team context about issues customers are experiencing.
• Provide data: Data and customer research supports CS & product discussions and makes calls to action more compelling. CS teams should share metrics, such as customer satisfaction scores or product usage data, in meetings with the product team to help them understand the significance of specific improvements & features.
• Build a categorization system: Organize feedback into categories to help the product team understand the types of issues customers are experiencing most often. These categories may include usability, functionality, performance, or design.

Sharing feedback in a clear, concise, and data-driven manner can help improve the product's performance, boost team morale, address customer pain points more efficiently, and lead to higher customer satisfaction.

Work together on product development

To take cross-departmental collaboration to the next level, the product team should involve customer success teams in key phases of the product development process. They may choose to invite CS to participate in product planning sessions, provide feedback on prototypes, or test beta versions of the product. By doing this, the product team gets more opportunities to hear what customers may specifically request or need.

Stay data-driven

Customer success teams must rely on customer data to understand their pain points, successes, and challenges, and make product recommendations from there. By staying data-driven throughout the customer journey, CS teams can help product make informed decisions on resource allocation, product updates, and new features.

In summary, improving collaboration between customer success and product is essential because it proves that your company is listening to the voice of the customer. Listening goes a long way when it comes to building trust and credibility — and your company will reap the benefits. 

‍