Alison Pickens

Founder and General Partner, Allison Pickens Ventures · 1 appearance on the record.

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Allison Pickens helped define the customer success category as the former Chief Customer Officer and Chief Operating Officer at Gainsight, scaling the SaaS platform past $80M ARR. She co-authored The Customer Success Economy and now invests in early-stage B2B AI and SaaS startups.

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5 insights · 2 disclosures · every statement was checked. none of them is a claim the record can settle: opinions, insights and disclosures never carry an assessment.

What they said7 Episodes1

Everything Alison Pickens said on the a16z Podcast that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Insight

Pickens: Customer success must report directly to the CEO

“I think people are realizing that customer success needs to report directly to the CEO.”

Alison Pickens Jan 2, 2019 ▶ 0:54 a16z Podcast | The Rise of the CCO

Insight

Pickens: NPS is not always correlated with revenue outcomes

“We found that NPS isn't always correlated with revenue outcomes.”

Alison Pickens Jan 2, 2019 ▶ 23:22 a16z Podcast | The Rise of the CCO

Disclosure

Pickens: Gainsight does not set quotas for its customer success managers

“We don't have quotas for our CSMs at Gainsight.”

Alison Pickens Jan 2, 2019 ▶ 4:23 a16z Podcast | The Rise of the CCO

Insight

Pickens: Recurring revenue requires distinct indicators for renewals, upsells, and advocacy

“We measure three different leading indicators of the three different types of revenue that you can drive in a recurring revenue business. So we've got a predictor of the renewal. We've got a predictor of upsell, which is actually the CSQLs, customer success qu…”

Alison Pickens Jan 2, 2019 ▶ 6:23 a16z Podcast | The Rise of the CCO

Disclosure

Pickens: Gainsight bonuses CSMs on health scores, CSQLs, and customer advocacy

“For each of these three metrics, our CSMs have targets every quarter, so they're held accountable for moving a certain number of customers into the green level of the health score every quarter, achieving a certain number of customer success qualified leads, a…”

Alison Pickens Jan 2, 2019 ▶ 6:44 a16z Podcast | The Rise of the CCO

Insight

Pickens: The SaaS sales model is an hourglass, not a funnel

“It's no longer a funnel. Actually, it's an hourglass”

Alison Pickens Jan 2, 2019 ▶ 12:14 a16z Podcast | The Rise of the CCO

Insight

Pickens: CS leaders fail when they give up budget battles early

“My biggest mistakes over the past four years have been related to budget and giving up on a budget battle too early. You've got to prove that case that you're truly aligned to revenue.”

Alison Pickens Jan 2, 2019 ▶ 19:58 a16z Podcast | The Rise of the CCO

Appearances (1)

Episode	Date	Speaking time
a16z Podcast \| The Rise of the CCO	Jan 2, 2019	5m

Alison Pickens

Appearances (1)

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