Toward Healthier B2B Relationships

Today's software makes it easier to track patterns, trends, and even granular details of how customers use products. This data is collected in systems that support marketing, sales, finance, and operations. But many companies aren't sure how they can best support employees who are overseeing hundreds of unique relationships. They're grappling with how to manage and use all their data to improve customer retention. And they're wondering how they can assess the health of their customer relationships before it's too late. One solution is the use of customer‑health scores. In this article the authors introduce a model that any B2B company can use to measure and improve customer health. They identify three dimensions of customer health-customer-relationship quality, product usage, and value realization-and offer advice on how to measure and weigh relevant metrics. The authors then take an in-depth look at how BigCommerce, an e-commerce platform, developed and refined its customer-health model. They share five lessons the company learned through the process, including how to identify the relationship between health and churn, and that a flywheel effect occurs as health scoring matures.