Case Study: Defining and Scaling Customer Success

Written By Devin Spence

How Seelman Consulting Helped a High-Growth Partner Align Customer Success Across Sales & Delivery

Client Overview

A fast-growing Salesforce consulting firm serving mid-market and enterprise clients was scaling rapidly—but struggling to define what “Customer Success” truly meant within their organization. Was it a post-sales function? A delivery function? A retention function? Or something that touched every part of the customer journey?

They engaged Seelman Consulting to bring clarity, structure, and operational excellence to their Customer Success function—and in doing so, created a model that strengthened both customer relationships and internal alignment.

The Challenge

The firm had invested heavily in sales and delivery but realized they lacked a cohesive Customer Success strategy that would drive long-term client satisfaction, growth, and retention. Key issues included:

  • Ambiguity of ownership: It was unclear whether Customer Success sat under Sales, Delivery, or needed to be its own function.

  • No standardized metrics: There were no shared KPIs or definitions of success across teams

  • Reactive engagement: Success managers were often firefighting rather than proactively guiding customers.

  • Disjointed communication: Internal teams lacked a shared playbook for how and when to engage clients post-implementation.

Seelman Consulting’s Approach

1. Stakeholder Interviews
 We began with a series of deep-dive interviews with leaders across Sales, Delivery, and Account Management to understand pain points, expectations, and success blind spots. We listened for what wasn’t being said—surfacing assumptions that had never been challenged.

2. Defining a Customer-Centric Operating Model
 Together, we defined Customer Success not as a department, but as a cross-functional discipline—a strategic function that sits at the intersection of Sales and Delivery. We helped them break down silos and identify clear touchpoints where Customer Success should lead, support, or advise.

3. Strategic Roadmap & Role Clarity
 We built a 12-month maturity roadmap with clear milestones for team structure, process evolution, and KPI adoption. This included:

  • Defining the role of the Customer Success Manager (CSM)

  • Clarifying handoffs between Sales, Delivery, and Success

  • Mapping out the customer lifecycle with aligned responsibilities

4. Success Metrics & KPIs
 We established measurable KPIs that reflected true customer health and internal effectiveness, including:

  • Net Revenue Retention (NRR)

  • Time-to-Value (TTV)

  • Executive Relationship Depth

  • Risk Signal Tracking & Escalation Cadence

  • Voice-of-Customer feedback loops

5. Templates, Tools & Routines
 To make Customer Success a repeatable practice, we delivered:

  • 1:1 templates for CSMs and customers

  • QBR (Quarterly Business Review) templates

  • Internal CSM coaching guides

  • Customer health scorecard framework

  • Communication playbooks for pre-go-live and post-go-live

The Outcome

In less than 90 days, the firm transitioned from an ad hoc post-sales model to a strategic, integrated Customer Success function that reinforced growth and client value at every stage of the journey. Specific results included:

  • Higher team confidence and clarity in customer interactions

  • Positive feedback from clients on consistency and communication

  • Increased collaboration between Sales, Delivery, and CSMs

Most importantly, Customer Success was no longer a “nice-to-have”—it became a core engine for growth.

Why This Matters for Salesforce Implementation Partners

Whether you’re a boutique Salesforce partner or scaling toward the Summit tier, Customer Success isn’t just a department—it’s your competitive edge. Your clients are buying outcomes, not just hours. If your teams aren’t aligned on delivering and growing those outcomes, someone else will.

At Seelman Consulting, we specialize in helping Salesforce partners operationalize Customer Success in a way that drives retention, expansion, and client advocacy. From strategic definition to hands-on execution, we help firms build a system that scales.

Ready to Build a Customer Success Engine?

If your firm is asking, “Where does Customer Success sit?”—you’re asking the right question. Let’s answer it together.

Contact Seelman Consulting to explore how we can help define and scale Customer Success for your organization.

Devin Spence
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