Customer Onboarding

Benchmark Report 2019

 Customer Onboarding insights from Enterprise
over 200 of the world’s most
innovative success-led companies...

Hyper-growth

2
 Foreword by Andy Mahood Hyper-growth companies are leading the customer onboarding
industry.
Taskfeed CEO
What we now see from these results, is that the practices and
processes of Hyper-growth businesses are available to all of us.
Welcome to the first edition of the State What is actually at the heart of this success is a true
of Customer Onboarding Report. As far commitment to putting that initial, rapid customer success
as we know, this report contains the most at the heart of their strategy and culture. And how that actually
plays out across the whole organisation is the story we want to
comprehensive
When we began collection ofsecond
working on our data on Customer Onboarding
take you through in these survey results, pulled together in the
Survey early in 2019 we expected to learn how companies were
customer onboarding
collaborating anywhere.
with customers, how they were using technology
form of the first, defined maturity model for our industry.
We call it our Customer Onboarding Success Scale.
to support them scale and how onboarding teams were using
metrics to drive decisions. However when we came to analyse Using the rich data gathered from over 250 Customer
the results that came in from the industry it became apparent Onboarding professionals from some of the most dynamic and
that there was another, bigger story that needed to be told. diverse businesses globally, and analysed through the lens of the
Hyper-growth success model, we have been able to define the
What we found was a maturity gap. The maturity gap wasn’t
four stages of maturity in customer onboarding for the first time.
only between the largest and smallest companies but also
between very fastest growing companies and similar sized Customer Onboarding as an industry is coming of age.
companies. In this report we define this cohort as ‘Hyper- Wherever you sit now on our maturity scale, the technology
growth’. Usually SaaS, they are scaling fast and they have the and insight is all available to you to see success faster, starting
investment to take them further. with Customer Onboarding. That fact that you are here now is a
Access to capital is not only what defines these fast scaling sure sign that you already realise the growth potential of
businesses, but a conviction that successful customer investing in customer success early. That in itself, puts you way
onboarding is critical to their growth. ahead of the game.

3
 "The fastest growing companies are
the ones who are focussed on stellar
Customer Onboarding. It’s these
Welcome to the first edition of the State businesses that are showing us how
of Customer Onboarding Report. As far to make every customer a success
as we know, this report contains the most story, from the very first touchpoint."
comprehensive collection of data on
customer onboarding anywhere.
Andy Mahood
CEO
Taskfeed

4
 1 People and Culture
Key Themes Customer Onboarding is becoming hard-baked into
company culture. Most of you now have dedicated CO teams,
and are committed to continual improvement across a range of
measures. The message is clear - Time to Value is important,
but only within an increasingly Customer First approach.
We have divided the results from our report
in three key themes. Within each theme, we
have presented the data, our interpretation 2 Process & Collaboration
Onboarding procedures may be getting more standardized,
and the key insights. By pulling the data but it still pays to hold your customer’s hand. The importance
apart and analysing these central themes of early Customer Success is no secret, but what we have seen
emerging more clearly this year is that is it the very first
we can now put it back together, in the form customer interventions that pack the biggest punch. With this
knowledge onboard, more investment in complex, high-touch
of the fullest picture available of good onboarding services makes perfect sense.
Customer Onboarding today.

3 Technology & Business Alignment

The business is there, but the technology is still playing
catch up. While businesses may be fully awake to the value of
onboarding, it is still mainly the Hyper-growth companies that
are following through and investing in the right technology for
the task. Where best-of-breed Customer Onboarding tools such
as Taskfeed are gaining ground, businesses are reporting great
results. At last, it’s time to move away from your spreadsheet....

5
 Contents 1 What is Customer Onboarding?

2 The Customer Onboarding Success Scale

3 The Results

– Company Demographics

– Key Themes

i People and Culture

ii Process & Collaboration

iii Technology & Business Alignment

4 Methodology

6
 What is Customer Onboarding? The term Customer Onboarding (CO) will be used
frequently throughout this report in its abbreviated form.
CO is your process to understand and support
customers to achieve their intended outcomes.

Your customer’s onboarding journey will often predict the

quality of relationship they’ll have with your business.
A poor experience will dramatically decrease their likelihood
to renew in the first year. By contrast, a successful,
scalable onboarding process leads to happy customers,
increased satisfaction, higher retention, more upsell and,
ultimately, advocacy. All of which are critical to a recurring
revenue business.

7
 "When a company is expanding worldwide,
you have to find more efficient ways of
onboarding and automation is the right
way to go. Doing nothing is not an option,
you have to progress and scale up."

Richie Vella
Head of PMO
SES

8
 Customer Onboarding Success Scale Customer Onboarding Maturity Model
Customer Onboarding is so much more than
technology. It’s a cornerstone of an organisational
culture that champions Customer Success, right
from the start.

This approach plays out across organisations in a

pattern that we have been able to pin down for the first
time in a maturity model for our industry.

With a focus on the pivotal organisational elements

of processes, people, culture, collaboration, technology
and business alignment, our model defines what
good looks like.

We call it our Customer Onboarding Success Scale.

Where are you?

9
 Survival Stepping Up Smarter Hyper Smart

Onboarding is an ad-hoc, means to Process is standardised but not Scaled onboarding for customer Proactive outcome focussed
Business Alignment an end outcome focussed success, not just configuration processes. Delivery is table stakes

- Ad hoc
- Repeatable and standardised - Predictable model based on
- Onboarding framework defined for
- Each customer has a different process used for all customers customer outcomes
customer segments and/or products
experience
- Process exists and services - Tailored onboarding plans for
Process
- Learnings are not folded back into each customer based on expected
- Understanding of the work required - Onboarding focussed on delivering
process outcomes of their products and
is clear outcomes not configurations
services
- Everything is urgent

- Onboarding has been given little - Onboarding customers effectively is - Customer Onboarding regarded as
- Customer Onboarding is a
consideration recognised as important, but not top key to Customer Success
cornerstone of company culture and
priority
Culture and people - Skill and experience mismatch, - Specific job titles ‘Onboarding success
onboarding is just one part of - CS or support team do the Manager’ or ‘Implementation
- VP ownership of onboarding
someone’s role onboarding Manager’

- Cross functional teams handing off

- Cross functional teams working
from one to another
- Disconnected teams and tools collaboratively together
Collaboration - Cross functional teams working
- Collaboration with customers is together incorporating the customer
(Internal and External) - People working individually - Customer and partners are included
handled over email, shared docs and
in the onboarding process
offline plans

- Tools are task based, but not - Technology supports real-time

- Real-time customer collaboration
- Basic tools, with little integration integrated organisation-wide collaboration across business,
platforms
customers and partners
Technology - Nothing more than spreadsheets - Collaboration with customers is
- Customer Onboarding integrated
and/or status fields in CRM handled over email, shared docs and - Integration of onboarding tools into
with education and user onboarding
10 offline plans business-wide platforms
 Company
Demographics
Welcome to the first edition of the State
of Customer Onboarding Report. As far
as we know, this report contains the most
comprehensive collection of data on
customer onboarding anywhere.

11
 What type of company are you? Early Stage: Growth (SMB):
Less than 10 years old and 50-500 employees
fewer than 50 employees
Your company will naturally fall into one of the four
cohorts outlined below. Each cohort helps us to
understand how companies at different stages of growth
approach Customer Onboarding.
We compared each data point between these four types
to help you compare your behaviour, process and
technology against similar companies.
Insight: Hyper-growth companies are scaling faster.
Characterised by revenue growth averaging at $3m
a year in 2018, today Hyper-growth are seeing revenue
increasing exponentially at a higher rate. Hyper-growth: Enterprise:
Raised over $10M in the more than 500 employees
last 5 years

12
 Onboarding Maturity by Segment
What the data shows The Enterprise cohort still leads the
way when it comes to the maturity of their onboarding
approach, although Hyper-growth companies follow closely
behind. SMBs and Early Stage business are lagging behind.

Our Interpretation With Hyper-growth achieving a 20% higher

maturity score than their SMB counterparts, this is one of the
clear differentiators between these two segments.
Maturity Score*
Insight

40.00

Whilst Hyper-growth business do have greater access to capital,

30.00 what is actually at the heart of this success is a true
Average of CO Score

commitment to putting that initial, rapid customer success at

the heart of their strategy and culture.
20.00

10.00

*Maturity score is calculated by aggregating certain data points including evidence

0.00
of a dedicated team, completion of milestones, standardisation of processes and
Enterprise Hyper-growth SMB Early stage
the use of an onboarding product.

13
 Customer Segment
What the data shows As you would expect, the four main
types of company participating remain the same for 2019
– Early Stage, SMB (small-to-medium business), Enterprise
and Hyper-growth.

4E
 arly stage
20% 1 Enterprise Our Interpretation Hyper-growth companies are
22%
characterised by their need to establish processes and
technology to drive growth. It’s this customer segment that
has grown the most in terms of their participation in the
survey, and this has had a corresponding influence on
Breakdown by Segment
findings.

Insight

2 Hyper-growth
33%
3 SMB The fastest growing companies are the ones with the
26% greatest interest in Customer Onboarding. There is a lot we can
learn from understanding how their onboarding operations are
supporting their growth.

14
 Region
What the data shows While we have seen better worldwide
representation across APAC, LATAM and EMEA, at 63%
North America is still the front runner in terms of Customer
Success adoption.

Insight

LATAM 2%
APAC 7%
Customer Success is gathering pace worldwide, but given
North America’s head start, the maturity gap will take time to
close in the regions beyond.

Breakdown by region

EMEA 28%

NA 62%

15
 Job Level
What the data shows The number of VP Level participants
Staff 42% has doubled since last year.
VP 18%

2018 Our Interpretation Customer Onboarding is moving up

to executive level. The survey this year brings insights
from a strategic perspective, as well as from those
implementing the strategy and delivering on the details
Manager 40% of customer onboarding.

Insight
Manager Level
10%

We have pinned down our job level categories this year

more accurately, to differentiate between staff and
management, and their corresponding priorities.

2019

VIP Level
34%

Staff Level 56%

16
 Job Function Customer Onboarding is still in the orbit of the Customer Success function

What the data shows As you would

expect, the great majority of our survey
Sales 2% respondents are working in a function,
Customer Services
which if not first and foremost within
70% Customer Success, can be considered
Operations 2%
directly linked e.g. Onboarding,
Implementation, Project Management
Services 3% & Service. However at 17%, only a minority
of survey respondents identify their
Project Manager function as primarily classed as
‘Onboarding’ or ‘Implementation’.
4%

Implementation
Our Interpretation This picture of job
5% Breakdown by Job Function
function is shaped to some degree by
those professionals who perform a wide
Onboarding range of Customer Success roles in one
12% business e.g. anything from onboarding
to renewal management.

Insight

When we start to see Customer Onboarding

recognised as a distinct function, this is an
indication that the industry has moved
towards a new level of maturity.

17
 1
What happens when Customer Onboarding is
People and Culture hard-baked into the culture and what does
this mean for individuals?

We take a look at the following patterns in the

Hyper-growth approach.

1 The growth of the Customer Success team

2 Customer Onboarding dedicated teams

3A
 no-charging approach to onboarding
services

18
 Customer Success Department Size Customer Success Department Size
A professional focus on Customer Success is a key component
of rapid growth.

What the data shows Larger Enterprises are running the

biggest Customer Success departments, with 60% numbering
over 30 people. Early Stage companies are typically operating
the smallest CS teams, with less than 3 people. In comparison,
Hyper-growth teams are most likely between 3-30.

100%
Our Interpretation Organisations characterised by a rapid
growth model are investing in building larger Customer
Success departments than their slower growing counterparts.
75%

Insight
1—3 50%

3 — 10
10 — 30
25%
30 — 100 SMBs and Hyper-growth companies differ chiefly in their level
100+ of funding. The fact that Hyper-growth businesses are investing
No dedicated
team
in CS is testament to their belief that this is a sure means of
0% sustaining their growth rate.
Enterprise Hyper-growth SMB Early stage

19
 Michelle Novak "At Iterable, one of our core values is Trust, and our
Enterprise Customer Success Manager onboarding plays a pivotal role in building trust
Iterable with every customer. As we recommend to our
Welcome to the first edition of the State audience of growth marketers, the 4 essential
of Customer Onboarding Report. As far ingredients to amazing onboarding are properly
as we know, this report contains the most orienting newcomers to your brand, building
comprehensive collection of data on connections across channels, enabling behavioral
customer onboarding anywhere. profiling for better personalization, and gathering
feedback to optimize your process."

"This isn’t just the role of our implementation

team — everyone at Iterable is dedicated to
practicing what we preach and delivering stellar
customer experiences."

20
 CO Dedicated Team
What the data shows 55% of Enterprise businesses have a
dedicated onboarding team, compared with just 35% of Early
100%
stage businesses.

75%

100+ 50%
Our Interpretation Early Stage businesses may not have the
30 — 100
scale to dedicate resources solely to customer onboarding. It
10 — 30
3 — 10 25% is likely that team members will cover a number of functions,
1—3 rather than specializing.
No dedicated
team
0% What’s clear is that companies with dedicated CO teams
Enterprise Hyper- SMB Early stage
growth
report higher satisfaction with their process.

Insight
Team report
satisfaction 100%
with process

75%
Our experience is that separating CS from onboarding teams
allows for specialization and ultimately better customer
50% outcomes, and plays an important part in the journey to
onboarding maturity.
25%
True
False
0%
Enterprise Hyper- SMB Early stage
growth
21
 "People often work with us not only because
of our technology, but because of our
knowledge base and huge community."
Welcome to the first edition of the State
of Customer Onboarding Report. As far
as we know, this report contains the most Nick Mehta
comprehensive collection of data on CEO
customer onboarding anywhere. Gainsight

www.trustradius.com/buyer-blog/interview-with-nick-mehta-ceo-gainsight

22
 Hyper-growth companies are not charging
for their high-touch onboarding services What the data shows Most businesses, irrespective of size,
are not charging for onboarding.

Our Interpretation From our survey data, we know that

Hyper-growth businesses in particular are delivering
high-touch onboarding, but generally not billing for these
work intensive services.

Charge for Customer Onboarding as a Service

Insight

40%

Hyper-growth companies understand that customers are

30% buying their expertise as a partner, not just their software.
This is success coaching, not customisation. Therefore rather
than looking to recoup the costs of this services via billing
Change

20% the customer, they consider it a value-add to their full

package offering.

10%

0%
Enterprise Hyper-growth SMB Early stage

Segment
23
 2
Commitment to Customer Success in terms
Process & Collaboration of investment and effort when it come
working processes.

The data has brought to light the following

themes that play out in Hyper-growth smart
onboarding practices.

1 Repeatable processes

2 Importance of Kick Off sessions

3 Investment in a high-touch, human-centric

onboarding process

24
 Repeatable processes
What the data shows High-touch businesses have largely
Yes
100% standardised their onboarding process, 85% for Enterprise,
No Hyper-growth, and Early Stage organisations, and 70% for
SMB.
75%

50%

Our Interpretation Organisations that have not implemented

a standardized high-touch process report low levels of
25%
satisfaction with this status quo. However, among those who
report they are working with repeatable playbooks for
onboarding, only 58% say that they are satisfied.
0%
Enterprise Hyper-growth SMB Early stage

Standardized high-touch process Insight

100%
% of companies satisfied with their process

75%
Having a standardized process is not the panacea for
trouble-free onboarding: it is however the first step in customer
onboarding maturity model.
50%

25%

0%
No standardized process Standardized process
25
 Kick-off sessions have most influence
on Customer Success What the data shows There is agreement across all size of
company that the initial kick-off and discovery sessions with
a new customer have the most influence on the success of
onboarding.

Insight

The importance of the kick off session cannot be

underestimated. A strategic direction is agreed and a way of
#1 CO Hyper- working defined at this point. It’s part of the onboarding process
Enterprise SMB Early stage Grand Total
Influence growth
that is unlikely to be repeated, and cannot be automated.

Kick-off/
55% 52% 48% 39% 49%
Discovery

Config. 17% 26% 19% 23% 22%

Training 6% 14% 14% 28% 15%

Handover 19% 7% 12% 12% 11%

Follow-up 6% 4% 10% – 5%

26
 Hyper-growth companies are
investing in High-touch What the data shows Hyper-growth companies are 25% more
likely to be investing in high-touch onboarding.

Our Interpretation Contrary to popular belief, high-growth

companies are investing primarily in high-touch human led
onboarding initiatives.

Insight

60%

Bringing sophisticated products into an organisations goes

far beyond functional deployment. This calls for thought
40%
leadership and change management skills set, which cannot be
automated. Over time, the impact of new technology will
diminish. Without the dedicated efforts of capable CSMs,
tech-touch may only provide effectively the bare minimum of
support.
20%

High-touch
Tech-touch
Neither
0%
Enterprise Hyper-growth SMB Early stage

27
 "At Signicat, we see the future of customer onboarding
as self-service for the simple products, and managed
onboarding for more complex products. We need to
scale, but to still keep the control."

Sofi Fahlberg
VP Operations
Signicat

28
 3
How are Hyper-Smart businesses using tools
Technology & Business Alignment for continual improvement in customer
outcomes, in terms of retention, revenue and
health?

1S
 alesforce is still the CRM platform
of choice

2B
 est-of-breed tools for Customer Success
and Customer Onboarding are not yet
mainstream

3S
 atisfaction with onboarding process is
driven by using best of breed tools

4 Assessing the impact of technology

29
 The CRM platform of choice
What the data shows Hubspot is showing signs of competing
with Salesforce for market share in the SMB and Early Stage
cohorts. When it comes to Hyper-growth and Enterprise
however, Salesforce retains its position as the dominant CRM
across all business segments.

CRM Market Share

Our Interpretation Salesforce is still the go-to-solution for
technology driven businesses when it comes to their choice
of business platform. While Hubspot may offer some
competition in the smaller business market, larger and fast
100%
growing organisations will still rely on this increasingly
mature platform as their technology touchstone.
75%
Insight

50%
Pipedrive
None
25%
Hyper-growth businesses recognise that Salesforce is more
Other
than a CRM - it is their business platform. Through
Hubspot
consolidating customer related data and processes on a single
Salesforce
business platform, it allows them to scale. The Enterprise,
0%
already operating at scale, continues to invest in Salesforce.
Enterprise Hyper-growth SMB Early stage

30
 Customer Success Management
tools market share What the data shows Amongst those businesses that rely on
a specialised CSM platform, Gainsight is the clear market
leader. However a significant proportion of smaller
businesses are not investing in CSM tools.

CSM Market Share Our Interpretation Many respondents are relying on

Salesforce to provide for their CSM needs. This is expected as
Salesforce offers flexibiliy as a business platform.

100% Insight

75%

ChumZero
Strikedeck
Specialist CSM platforms e.g. Gainsight, are still not a
50%
mainstream choice, particularly for smaller or newer
Totango
Natero
businesses. Our prediction is CSM tools are on the cusp of
Other
crossing over into mainstream usage, as the Hyper-growth early
25%
adopters demonstrate the value they are driving from their
Gainsight
investment in CSM platforms.
Salesforce
None
0%
Enterprise Hyper-growth SMB Early stage

31
 "Salesforce is a great CRM and
you can do a lot with it.
However, Taskfeed is an extension
Welcome to the first editionof
ofthis
the State
and allows us to use
of Customer Onboarding Report. As fareven better. We could
Salesforce
as we know, this report contains
havethe mostour way around in
hacked
comprehensive collection ofSalesforce,
data on but having a tool which
customer onboarding anywhere.sits within it is the ideal state."

Nick Turner
Head of Onboarding
GoCardless

32
 Tools used in Onboarding
What the data shows Salesforce and the use of spreadsheets
have the largest market share when it comes to onboarding
tools.

Our Interpretation There is a wide range of tools in use

industry-wide, to manage customer onboarding with no clear
market-share leaders. At all levels, spreadsheets are still in
use, along with a range of other general purpose suites (Jira,
Smartsheet etc) Dedicated customer onboarding tools are a
relatively new concept.

Asana
100%
Insight
Beynd
Hubspot
75%
Zendesk
Jira
As the dominant market CRM, organisations are recognising
Smartsheet
50% the need for more automation, management, and metrics and
Gainsight
starting out by building ad-hoc onboarding capabilities within
Other
the Salesforce platform. There is still a minority of businesses
None
25% with mature CO functions that are investing in ready-to-go best
Taskfeed
of breed solutions such as Taskfeed and Gainsight and
Spreadsheet
experiencing greater satisfaction levels as a result.
Salesforce
0%
Enterprise Hyper-growth SMB Early stage

Customer Onboarding Tools (Grouped)

33
 Satisfication with Onboarding process
What the data shows Participants report highest levels of
satisfaction across fit-for-purpose customer onboarding
solutions, with Taskfeed having the highest satisfaction rate
(84%), followed by Gainsight at 71%. Spreadsheet users
reported the lowest levels of satisfaction.

Our Interpretation The rate of satisfaction with onboarding

processes is clearly linked to the use of tools specifically for
this purpose e.g. Taskfeed or Gainsight, or at least
configurable (Salesforce)
Customer
% satisfied
Onboarding Tool
Insight
Taskfeed 84%

Gainsight 71% Leading high-touch businesses are selecting best-of-bread tools

for their onboarding, as opposed to making the best of generic
Salesforce 61% solutions. This technology choice is an important part of the
maturity model.

Smartsheet 40%

Spreadsheet 37%

34
 Measuring the impact of
Customer Onboarding What the data shows While the majority of survey
respondents who strongly believe onboarding has an impact,
over half are not actually measuring this level of impact.
The percentage of companies that told us that they
strongly believe that measurement across specific
data points has an impact, but are not actually
following through with the required process.
Our Interpretation The belief in onboarding is strong but
when it comes to measurement, the tools are not in place
to back this up with the required data points e.g. CSat,
Retention, Health, LTV, and up-sell.

Insight

60%

Businesses are missing the chance to showcase the true

impact of onboarding and the positive influence it has at
40% 56% 59% 54% 58% 50%
all stages of the customer lifecycle.

There is a big opportunity here to align your technology

20%
with your business goals and represent the importance
and impact of CO.

0% Only when we can represent the true impact of CO, can we

Customer Rentention Customer Lifetime Value Up-Sell
Satisfaction Health expect to see this customer stage given the priority it deserves.

35
 Methodology How we compiled the report

This year’s report is based on a survey completed by over 250

professionals working at SaaS or technology product
companies in roles relating to customer onboarding. Of these,
Welcome to the first edition of the State 45% were Managers, VPs, SVPs and C-level working in various
types of business – from early stage Start-Ups through to
of Customer Onboarding Report. As far Hyper-growth and Enterprise companies. We combined the first
party survey results with third party company data from
as we know, this report contains the most Crunchbase to create a complete profile of the companies
comprehensive collection of data on involved, including estimated revenue, fundraising and
company growth.
customer onboarding anywhere.
Acknowledgements We’d like to thank everyone who took part
in this year’s survey. Please share these survey results with your
network so we can engage more Customer Onboarding
professionals in the conversation on what good looks like today.
We’d love to get even more respondents next year for an even
bigger, more diverse survey and sample size. The more detailed
the picture we can paint, and the more insights we can offer on
the state of Customer Onboarding.

36
Get in touch and let’s
talk about how you
can see success
faster with Taskfeed
[email protected]
www.taskfeedapp.com

Copyright 2019 Taskfeed is a product by Tapply Limited. All rights reserved. Company Registration No: 08332938