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Metrics: prove the value sales soldEconomic Buyer: keep them close before renewalDecision Criteria: mature the criteria to grow the accountDecision Process: run the renewal like a dealForecast renewals on evidence: six questionsStart at the handoff FAQThe framework that ran the deal doesn't change after the close. What changes is where the risk hides. In new logo deals, risk lives in the sales cycle. In renewals and expansions, it lives in the time between cycles: the handoff, the delivery and the value story.
| Letter | In sales, you... | In customer success, you... |
|---|---|---|
| Metrics | Promise the value in a business case | Prove it was delivered, against the baseline |
| Economic Buyer | Reach them to win the deal | Stay close to them to keep it |
| Decision Criteria | Shape the criteria to win | Mature the criteria to grow |
| Decision Process | Run a mutual action plan to signature | Run one for the renewal, three to four months out |
| Paper Process | Map legal and procurement | Remember the process has memory: a messy last cycle costs you this one |
| Identify Pain | Find the problem worth solving | Keep it solved, and find the next one |
| Champion | Build someone who sells for you | Re-test them, and build new ones as people move |
| Competition | Beat the status quo and rivals | Beat budget cuts, turnover and "we're going in a different direction" |
Metrics: prove the value sales sold
Sales sold the customer on a business case. Then the deal closed and nobody measured it again. So at renewal, you can't show what changed.
Five steps to carry the business case forward:
- In the handoff from sales, transfer the metrics and the business case details.
- During implementation, review that business case with your client. It becomes a guiding tenet of the relationship.
- Build a process with your customer to capture current-state data. That's your starting point.
- Every quarter, compare where they are now to where they started. Plan it in detail. Don't skimp on it.
- Turn it into one executive summary slide, shared with key stakeholders every quarter: starting metrics, trend lines of improvement, and the story of what those changes did for the business.
Don't drown them in data. Stick to what was in the original business case. If you can't compare before and after, it won't show impact. The goal is contrast: value so clear there's no room for questions.
Value realization is a chain. Every feature they use drives an impact. Every impact moves a metric. Every metric ties back to the business case the economic buyer approved. Track usage tied to outcomes, not vanity activity, and measure the impact the same way every time.
If you can't measure it, you can't prove it. If you can't prove it, you can't protect it. When you hear "we've had to cut our budget, and your solution is on the list," the miss didn't happen at renewal. It happened months earlier, in value realization.
Video · MEDDPICC for Customer Success
MEDDPICC for Customer Success: Prove the Value Before Budget Cuts · David Weiss on YouTube
Economic Buyer: keep them close before renewal
Your main contact leaves. The executive who funded you is told to cut projects, and nobody at the top knows what you delivered. That's how programs get defunded.
At renewal, the Economic Buyer is whoever can approve this spend. Inside the current budget, that's often the functional leader. An increase may need the CFO.
Six ways customer success keeps that relationship warm before you need it:
- At implementation, have sales introduce you to the Economic Buyer. Position it as: we want to ensure your success and define what that means to you.
- Learn their success criteria, the metrics they want improved and the business priorities behind the project.
- Introduce a relevant executive from your side, with a recap of that conversation.
- Invite them to every QBR. Joined or not, send a recap of the metrics that matter to them.
- When you spot expansion, surface it executive to executive. If you've proven value against their priorities, they'll listen.
- Keep it warm: thought leadership, event invites, referrals and good news about your product.
Do this, and when the unforeseen hits, you're the last project cut and the first one funded.
The no-ask executive update. After each MBR or QBR, send your executive sponsor a short recap: value delivered against the original outcomes, progress on adoption and impact, and one risk you're actively addressing. No ask unless you truly need one. It protects you from budget surprises and makes future asks easier.
Video · MEDDPICC for Customer Success
How Customer Success Keeps the Economic Buyer Close (Before Renewal) · David Weiss on YouTube
Decision Criteria: mature the criteria to grow the account
They already bought, so why do decision criteria still matter? Because if you don't know what they bought for, you can't drive success and you can't grow the account.
Start at the handoff. What were their criteria? Which were need-to-haves, which were nice-to-haves, and what problems were they meant to solve? Review it with the buying team. Ask what wasn't important and why. Then make their top priorities your top priorities for implementation and adoption.
Then build the maturity curve. Nice-to-haves often become need-to-haves. Don't let the rest of your solution sit on the back burner. Use every QBR: prove the value with metrics, then close with new recommendations, other problems you can solve and new insights. Build a client roadmap with the other stakeholders you'll need, so you keep meeting new people in the account.
Every new criterion you help them define is one more reason to stay. That's your moat.
Video · MEDDPICC for Customer Success
Decision Criteria in Customer Success: Turn Nice-to-Haves into Growth · David Weiss on YouTube
Decision Process: run the renewal like a deal
A few weeks before the contract ends, you email your main contact: "Ready to renew?" Fingers crossed. Then you hear it. "We're going in a different direction." "We're cutting licenses." "We're open to renewing for a lot less."
In sales, the decision process is buttoned up: mutual action plans, compelling events, executive alignment. A renewal deserves the same.
- Start the renewal three to four months out with a mutual action plan.
- Long before that, drive adoption, realize the metrics and keep executives seeing the value. A quiet customer doesn't mean nothing's wrong. If usage is low, fix it now. If impact isn't tracked, track it.
- Remember the paper process has memory. If the last cycle was messy, procurement and legal will make you pay for it.
Pick one account. Do you really know their renewal process, what they need to see to approve it, who signs and what it takes to grow? If you can't answer with facts, that's a gap. Go close it.
Video · MEDDPICC for Customer Success
Why Renewals Go Wrong (And How to Run the Renewal Decision Process) · David Weiss on YouTube
Forecast renewals on evidence: six questions
The same evidence standard runs your new-business forecast too; see MEDDPICC forecasting.
If your renewals keep pushing, your forecast is running on hope. It comes down to six questions, two on value and four on the mutual action plan.
Value
- Have we achieved the business case and success criteria the client wanted?
- Do we have an executive sponsor, and do they agree we delivered the value they were looking for?
The mutual action plan
- Is there a critical event: a go-live, the contract renewal date, an important deadline?
- Is there an agreed backward timeline with every activity that needs to happen?
- Has it been shared with and agreed to by your champions and the Economic Buyer?
- Is there a weekly meeting on the calendar tracking everything to the signature date?
Answer each one with proof: a name, a date, a document. If you're guessing, that's a gap to close. All six in place and forecast accuracy goes through the roof. Without them, it's a hope and a prayer.
Video · MEDDPICC for Customer Success
Renewal Forecasting: 6 Questions to Stop Deals From Pushing · David Weiss on YouTube
Start at the handoff
Most of this depends on one moment: the handoff from sales. Before sales steps away, transfer the deal in a way customer success can actually run: baselines and outcomes, what the customer believed they were buying and why, what success looks like in their language, the stakeholders who held power, and every commitment made.
A handoff isn't complete until the new owner agrees on the outcomes and how adoption and value will be tracked. The full checklist: The Sales-to-Customer Success Handoff.