5 steps to closing more upsells in 2024
Revenue Growth Guide - Dec '23
It’s December and folks are officially starting to answer emails with some form of “Let’s circle back on this after the holidays.”
‘Tis the season.
Actually, that’s a pretty good segue into this month’s newsletter topic, which is how to have the right conversations at the right times with the right people; specifically, upsell conversations with your customers.
Historically, these conversations can be tricky; even more so in this economy (?!). Budgets are tighter and companies are looking for ways to reduce their tech spend rather than execute the kind of large-scale layoffs that have, unfortunately, become part and parcel of the past year or so.
This means SaaS companies need to do a few key things to avoid stagnant accounts that hinder growth:
Track and analyze customers’ usage and in-product behavior.
Clearly define what upsell-readiness looks like.
Communicate regularly with customers leading up to upsell conversations.
Personalize your approach.
Streamline the whole process with good automation.
Let’s break those down.
Track usage & behavior data
If you’ve implemented PLG, you’re already doing this; but even if you don’t have a self-serve motion, this data is critical to giving your reps visibility into the full customer lifecycle. Understanding the way your customers are using your product and what their journeys look like based on things like buyer persona, industry, company size, etc. is going to help you with all the other things I’ve listed here. Having complete, accurate data is a requirement for making the smartest decisions for your business.
Define upsell-readiness criteria
What signals that your customer is upsell-ready? Are they consistently exceeding the usage limit of their current plan/tier? Are they exhibiting in-product behavior that indicates power-user potential?
One commonly cited example is Slack: If a free Slack user sends a certain number of messages in a given time period, it’s an indication that user is likely ready to convert to a paid plan. So, Slack deploys in-app messaging to encourage that conversion.
Having well-defined upsell criteria means your reps aren’t guessing about when to have those conversations and they aren’t leaving revenue on the table.
Communicate regularly
Ah, the Sales to CS handoff. This is where many buyers-turned-customers experience friction; notably, a sharp decline in communication and support.
It’s easy to understand why this happens. With so much focus and energy going into closing the deal, the handoff to CS is where teams can take their foot off the gas and celebrate the win.
But for the customer, their needs haven’t changed. They don’t want to feel like they’ve been handed off and become just another number.
So how do we solve for this? By leveraging that usage and behavior data to build an intentional customer nurture that keeps existing customers engaged in the time between sales conversations.
Personalize the upsell approach
Your customers are much more likely to be receptive to an upsell conversation if you come prepared with recommendations backed by their individual behaviors, needs, interests, etc.
Not only that, but tailoring the approach itself to the individual customer–how they communicate, what’s important to them in their role, and what motivates them to buy–will also help build trust and increase your chances of closing an upsell.
Automate the process
And really, how much harder would this all be without good automation? Reducing the amount of manual work to be done by your reps means more time they have to spend actually building relationships and doing the work automation can’t do. It also means the process is done the same way every time, so your data is cleaner and steps never get missed.
We’ve done a lot of this kind of work; building automation to provide more visibility into the customer lifecycle, gauge upsell-readiness, and alert account managers when key usage thresholds are reached.
We’ll be diving even deeper into this in the coming weeks on our website, but if this is something you’re looking to tackle, reach out to us! Our team is always happy to chat, no strings attached.
As always, email me if you have any feedback, questions, or anything else. If you do, I promise I won’t say we should circle back after the holidays.
Until 2024,
Kristi