Expertise · B2B SaaS
Account Management for B2B SaaS vendors
The CSM prevents the departure. The Account Manager grows the account. At a B2B SaaS vendor the two jobs touch, and the second is most often left to individual flair. I build the commercial side of the role: the ARR sitting in contracts already signed.
Five workstreams
Renewals
A renewal is prepared months before the due date. Who decides, on which budget, by which date: that gets established before the renewal quarter, not during it.
Expansion
Upsell and cross-sell, with individual renewal and expansion targets, tracked as seriously as sales targets.
Discount policy
A discount with no explicit rule, no commitment threshold and no counterpart teaches the customer that patience pays. The rule is written before the negotiation.
Differentiated increases
One percentage applied to the whole portfolio loses accounts on one side and leaves money on the other. Useful segmentation rests on integration depth and how hard it is to leave.
Key accounts
Following the accounts that matter: an identified economic buyer, several contacts, a regular value review kept separate from any contract date.
Two roles, one boundary
The CSM: preventing churn
Adoption, account health, risk detection, escalation. The result reads in retention.
The AM: growing ARR
Renewal, upsell, cross-sell, increases. The result reads in expansion.
The boundary
It is written before an important account deteriorates: who holds the relationship, who answers for the renewal figure, who decides a discount, from what amount.
Who it is for
Vendors whose CSMs have no revenue target
A team that protects the base with no expansion quota.
Vendors where sales takes the renewal back
When no Account Manager exists, or when targets overlap with the CSM's.
The method has four stages, and the last one organises my departure. See it under Working together →
The NRR simulator is free to use, with no sign-up. See the tools →
The other side
The customer who stays
Growing an account means not losing it. Preventing churn is the CSM's job, covered on the Customer Success page.
Explore the Customer Success expertise →In the glossary
A first thirty-minute conversation
Thirty minutes is enough to tell whether your topic calls for a diagnostic, a build-out or something else. No strings attached.