Job Description

First Student is seeking a passionate and experienced Customer Success Manager to serve as a liaison between First Student customers, business development, field operations and other cross functional teams to deliver on retention goals. Hand-in-hand with operations, this person will be responsible for providing strategic support and leadership to manage and elevate retention and growth activities within First Student’s existing customer base.The Customer Success Manager will develop and foster executive business relationships with customers to ensure contract retention. Partnering with operations, they will drive the delivery of contract renewals, timely product implementation, account reviews, increased account product presentation, elevated customer satisfaction and goodwill activities. Responsibilities include retention account planning/strategy development and execution in coordination with operations. This person will have a direct impact on growing and maintaining retention rates of our customers from the time we win/acquire new business through their lifecycle. Exerted efforts will result in the successful on-boarding of new customers and increased retention and upsell/cross sell rates. Success KPIs will encompass customer onboarding, retention, growth and profitability, and execution of marketing/customer/community engagement strategies.

Major Responsibilities

• Support a dedicated area and/or region to achieve growth and customer retention objectives while developing and maintaining trusted relationships at all levels within the customer organization.
• Work collaboratively with region/area/local operational leadership to develop and support delivery of full account planning processes to improve retention and upsell customers. Plans will include strategic initiatives to drive retention and elevate revenue as well as processes to manage activity towards strategy execution.
• Develop and support region with customer engagement and account management tools. These will eventually be tracked in Salesforce.
• Share technology and service offering information, insights and benefits to help the customer understand and compare to other providers and share the advantages, values and benefits of First Student to parents and community members.
• Partner with operations to onboard new customers obtained via both business development and acquisition. Establish, track and report on shared success criteria.
• Work cross-functionally with field operations, business development, marketing and communications teams to deliver a focused message and high level of customer satisfaction.
• Host regular check-ins and business reviews with customers to ensure adoption of new technology or services and realization of success criteria.
• Accurately report and monitor health of customer deployments and drive corrective action plans with operations, where needed.
• Partner with business development team by identifying new business opportunities for expanding First Student footprint.
• Consult regularly with customers to fully understand their needs and actively solve pain points. Provide recommendations and work collaboratively to drive actions to improve the customer experience (working with operations, finance, marketing, technology development, sales, training, etc.…)
• Establish, track and report on shared success criteria and desired process metrics/ KPI’s for large and/or at-risk customers. Collaborate with operational leaders to drive accountability. Suggest methods to improve area operations, efficiency and service to customers.
• Partner with operations to document and escalate recurring themes or issues found in customer comments and complaints, and ensure the information is given to the right people to resolve.
• Actively use Salesforce to manage/update relationship information. Monitor accounts and align with region to ensure all required data is uploaded/maintained. Help support the field to increase Salesforce maturity.
• Act as project manager for various departmental initiatives.
• Provide competitive insights & product recommendations to the leadership team
• Other duties as required or assigned.

Minimum Education or Certifications Required

• Bachelor’s degree or similar college level education, or 3-5 years of related experience and/or training

Minimum Experience or Skills Required

• 3 years of customer success and/or customer account management experience
• B2B experience with accounts exceeding $100,000/year
• A history of developing new accounts
• Experience serving as a customer advocate with the ability to understand the needs of the client and deliver on those needs
• Excellent writing skills, with a strong orientation to detail and service.
• Experience using customer relationship management software, Salesforce strongly preferred
• Advanced knowledge of word processing, spreadsheet and presentation software.
• Project management experience strongly preferred
• Ability to exercise independent thinking with a high level of prioritization skills
• Ability to generate creative ideas, meet multiple deadlines and work independently.
• Knowledge of business and management principles.
• Travel is required

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