Customer Success and Culture: 2 Keys to Success with Tom Lavery

When investors are leaning on you to get “New Logos” you can lose sight of customer success and it can change or damage your culture. 

For Tom Lavery at Jiminny, compromising on customer success or culture were not options. 

Tom was a VP of sales before he, his wife and their technical cofounder started the company. He set out to solve some of the problems he faced around coaching as a sales leader. 

Tom understands that effective sales leadership starts with data. Jiminny's platform records, transcribes, and analyzes video, voice, and email communications, providing valuable insights for sales leaders.

From the beginning he did the selling and his first hires for sales were not sellers, but customer success managers. This was pivotal to his growth because customers had high user adoption and because of that renewed and told others. 

His entire team is focused on customer success because of his strong culture. 

In seven short years, his team has grown tremendously, and they work as a team to retain customers, find new prospects and guide buyers through to a decision. 

Even with his amazing team, he plays an important role in sales. 

Listen to Tom share his growth story with Alice and his passion for maintaining a great culture. 

Chapters

02:52 Tom Lavery's background and inspiration for starting Jiminny

09:49 Getting the first sales through networking and local interactions

12:22 User adoption and expanding the use of Jiminny

12:29 Product market fit is tricky and takes time to achieve.

15:22 Customer success was a priority and received more investment than sales.

20:19 A formal referral process was implemented to drive referrals.

24:55 Customer success and sales must work together in a team.

27:14 CEO's involvement in sales is based on deal management and support.

30:36 Importance of data mining and insights in sales and marketing.

37:14 Changing players in the team as the company grows and matures.

38:04 Tom Lavery talks about never giving up and offering support

About Guest

Tom has over 15 years of experience in high-growth VC/PE-backed SaaS companies.  Tom is currently the CEO and Founder of Jiminny, a Conversation Intelligence Platform that helps companies maximize their team's revenue.  Prior to starting Jiminny, he was SVP at Reward Gateway and saw them through two PE-backed buyouts.

Social Links 

You can learn more about and connect with Tom Lavery in the links below.

Connect with Tom on LinkedIn:

(99+) Tom Lavery | LinkedIn

Check out Jiminny's website:

Revenue & Conversation Intelligence Software | Jiminny

(99+) Jiminny: Overview | LinkedIn

You can learn more about and connect with Alice Heiman in the links below.

Connect with Alice on LinkedIn:

(99+) Alice Heiman | LinkedIn

Check out Alice’s website:

Alice Heiman - Alice Heiman