Mastering CS: Candid Leader Insights

Custify | Customer Success
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Welcome to Mastering CS – Candid Leader Insights, where I, Irina Cismas, Head of Marketing at Custify, take you on a journey into the depths of Customer Success. Each episode, I sit down with some of the most influential minds in the CS world, from seasoned managers and renowned influencers to dynamic team leaders, to uncover the challenges and opportunities that shape our profession. Our conversations are rich with insights, drawing on personal experiences and innovative ideas to offer practical solutions. Join me as we make every interaction count in the dynamic world of Customer Success!

  1. 1d ago

    Ep 89 | Kevin Andrews

    In this episode of the podcast, Irina Cismas, Head of Marketing at Custify, sits down with Kevin Andrews, Product Engagement Manager at BombBomb, a video messaging platform. Kevin spent eight months leading CS and support earlier this year, having previously worked across sales, CS, and product over nearly 10 years at the company. He shares what it was like to step into an interim CS leadership role, what metrics actually tell you something meaningful, how to weigh loud customer feedback against everyone else, and why perfect is the villain of done. What You’ll Learn: ☑️ What BombBomb does and what the CS and support team structure looks like ☑️ Why Kevin was asked to lead CS as a product person and what that transition taught him ☑️ What he looked for when hiring a new Head of CS and why empathy and systems thinking came first ☑️ What metrics actually matter when video count alone tells you nothing ☑️ How BombBomb started tying video usage to deal outcomes rather than just recording volume ---- With Custify, you can: ☑️ automate daily tasks through Playbooks ☑️ build individual customer #HealthScores ☑️ create customer segments ☑️ improve your customer communication strategy ☑️ streamline your onboarding process ☑️ track customers’ journeys every step of the way ☑️ get a 360 view of their progress Want to do great things with your customer success initiative? Keep in touch with us below: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Custify Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Contact Us⁠

  2. 3d ago

    Ep 88 | Daniel Hyre

    In this episode of the podcast, Irina Cismas, Head of Marketing at Custify, sits down with Daniel Hyre, Customer Success Manager at ScreenCloud, a digital signage platform for managing screens across offices and locations. Daniel's path into CS is anything but conventional: fine wine, estate planning, carbon trading, and now digital signage. His background in industries where you can never push a sale shapes how he builds trust with customers. He shares how ScreenCloud uses AI signals to stay proactive, what good onboarding looks like when the real milestone is moving from IT to HR adoption, and why slowing down is the best advice he gives to anyone new to CS. What You’ll Learn: ☑️ What ScreenCloud does and what the CSM role looks like across enterprise, mid-market, and scaled segments ☑️ How ScreenCloud uses AI to eliminate admin and stay proactive rather than reactive ☑️ What tools sit at the center of the CS operation: Hook, Salesforce, Notion, Slack, and Zapier ☑️ What good onboarding looks like and why the real milestone is when IT hands the platform to HR ☑️ How the renewal process is structured and why 90 to 60 days is the sweet spot ---- With Custify, you can: ☑️ automate daily tasks through Playbooks ☑️ build individual customer #HealthScores ☑️ create customer segments ☑️ improve your customer communication strategy ☑️ streamline your onboarding process ☑️ track customers’ journeys every step of the way ☑️ get a 360 view of their progress Want to do great things with your customer success initiative? Keep in touch with us below: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Custify Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Contact Us⁠

  3. Sep 10

    Ep 87 | Donia Hesham

    In this episode of the podcast, Irina Cismas, Head of Marketing at Custify, sits down with Donia Hesham, Senior Customer Success Specialist at WalaPlus, an employee loyalty and rewards platform serving organizations across the Middle East. With a background in investment management and banking, Donia brings a unique perspective to Customer Success and managing complex account portfolios. She shares what it takes to manage 100+ accounts, how she tiers her portfolio to focus on what matters most, what effective onboarding looks like in a market where WhatsApp often beats email, and why understanding your customers’ targets is essential to achieving your own. What You’ll Learn: ☑️ What WalaPlus does and what the CSM role looks like across a multi-sector portfolio ☑️ How the team tiers accounts and why effective tiering takes time ☑️ What effective onboarding looks like and how to spot the “aha” moment ☑️ What it takes to manage and support a portfolio of 100+ accounts ---- With Custify, you can: ☑️ automate daily tasks through Playbooks ☑️ build individual customer #HealthScores ☑️ create customer segments ☑️ improve your customer communication strategy ☑️ streamline your onboarding process ☑️ track customers’ journeys every step of the way ☑️ get a 360 view of their progress Want to do great things with your customer success initiative? Keep in touch with us below: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Custify Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Contact Us⁠

  4. Sep 3

    Ep 86 | Konstantin Kleemann

    In this episode of the podcast, Irina Cismas, Head of Marketing at Custify, sits down with Konstantin Kleemann, Senior Customer Success Manager at SAP Taulia, a working capital platform that helps companies pay suppliers faster while freeing up cash. With years of experience structuring working capital deals for corporate treasury teams at UniCredit, Konstantin brings a unique perspective on the buyer side of Customer Success. He shares what CS looks like in a two-sided platform serving both buyers and suppliers, how the team uses AI agents and Salesforce to manage a global portfolio, and why building trust early is the habit that shapes everything that follows. What You’ll Learn: ☑️ What SAP Taulia does and what the CSM role looks like across a two-sided platform ☑️ How CS spans implementation, program management, and supplier engagement ☑️ What effective onboarding looks like for both buyers and suppliers ☑️ How the team tracks customer health and success after a program goes live ☑️ Why building trust early shapes the entire customer lifecycle ---- With Custify, you can: ☑️ automate daily tasks through Playbooks ☑️ build individual customer #HealthScores ☑️ create customer segments ☑️ improve your customer communication strategy ☑️ streamline your onboarding process ☑️ track customers’ journeys every step of the way ☑️ get a 360 view of their progress Want to do great things with your customer success initiative? Keep in touch with us below: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Custify Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Contact Us⁠

  5. Sep 1

    Ep 85 | Noémie Tosser

    In this episode of the podcast, Irina Cismas, Head of Marketing at Custify, sits down with Noémie Tosser, Customer Success Manager at Simundia, a digital coaching platform helping organizations move from ambition to action. Noémie works in a world where customer success can't be measured through clicks or logins. She shares how she evaluates whether a coaching journey is truly working, the challenges of understanding complex HR needs, where the CSM role begins and ends when the product is centered on human behavior change, and why taking a step back has become one of her most valuable professional habits. What You’ll Learn: ☑️ What Simundia does and what the CSM role looks like in digital coaching ☑️ How to measure customer success when outcomes are behavioral, not transactional ☑️ Why understanding complex HR challenges takes time and continuous learning ☑️ Whether industry-specific knowledge is necessary when stepping into a new CS role ☑️ What managing complex accounts at Acolad taught Noémie about Customer Success ---- With Custify, you can: ☑️ automate daily tasks through Playbooks ☑️ build individual customer #HealthScores ☑️ create customer segments ☑️ improve your customer communication strategy ☑️ streamline your onboarding process ☑️ track customers’ journeys every step of the way ☑️ get a 360 view of their progress Want to do great things with your customer success initiative? Keep in touch with us below: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Custify Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Contact Us⁠

  6. Aug 28

    Ep 84 | Freddie Franklin

    In this episode of the podcast, Irina Cismas, Head of Marketing at Custify, sits down with Freddie Franklin, Head of Customer Success at zeroheight, a platform that helps design and engineering teams build and manage their design systems. Freddie shares how he structured a team of five CSMs, how zeroheight uses Claude as a reasoning layer across its tool stack, and what AI agents the team has built to support Customer Success. He also discusses what changed when CS took on commercial accountability, how he handles procurement pressure at renewal, and why understanding the “why” is the habit that has shaped his approach to Customer Success. What You’ll Learn: ☑️ What zeroheight does and what the Head of CS role looks like across a team of five CSMs ☑️ How zeroheight connects HubSpot, Sybil, Juro, and Claude across its CS workflow ☑️ What AI agents the team has built and the problems they solve ☑️ What Freddie prioritized during his first year at zeroheight ☑️ What changed when CS became accountable for revenue and how SPICE helped ☑️ How to handle procurement pressure at renewal without relying on discounts ☑️ Why the Golden Circle and Five Whys remain useful frameworks for CS leaders ---- With Custify, you can: ☑️ automate daily tasks through Playbooks ☑️ build individual customer #HealthScores ☑️ create customer segments ☑️ improve your customer communication strategy ☑️ streamline your onboarding process ☑️ track customers’ journeys every step of the way ☑️ get a 360 view of their progress Want to do great things with your customer success initiative? Keep in touch with us below: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Custify Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Contact Us⁠

  7. Aug 18

    Ep 83 | Pratiksha Tewari

    In this episode of the podcast, Irina Cismas, Head of Marketing at Custify, sits down with Pratiksha Tewari, Senior Customer Success Manager at Tars, a platform for building conversational AI agents. With a background in field operations and Salesforce implementation, as well as experience as a certified Scrum Master, Pratiksha shares how she approaches Customer Success when every customer's definition of success is different. She discusses running onboarding like product sprints, measuring customer health across multiple funnel stages, and why undercommitting and over-delivering remains one of her most important habits. What You’ll Learn: ☑️ What Tars does and what the CSM role looks like across diverse use cases ☑️ How Pratiksha balances strategy and execution across a varied book of business ☑️ What effective onboarding looks like when building a conversational AI agent ☑️ Why customer health varies by use case and how to measure it across the funnel ☑️ What the operational infrastructure behind CS at Tars looks like ---- With Custify, you can: ☑️ automate daily tasks through Playbooks ☑️ build individual customer #HealthScores ☑️ create customer segments ☑️ improve your customer communication strategy ☑️ streamline your onboarding process ☑️ track customers’ journeys every step of the way ☑️ get a 360 view of their progress Want to do great things with your customer success initiative? Keep in touch with us below: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Custify Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Contact Us⁠

  8. Aug 13

    Ep 82 | Oksana Aloshyna

    In this episode of the podcast, Irina Cismas, Head of Marketing at Custify, sits down with Oksana Aloshyna, Strategic Customer Success Manager at ShortPoint. With more than eight years at the company, Oksana shares her journey from Support to strategic Customer Success and what she has learned about building effective CS infrastructure without overcomplicating it. She discusses personalized outreach, customer health scoring, journey mapping, knowledge bases, practical AI use cases, and why strong customer relationships remain one of the most valuable parts of Customer Success. What You’ll Learn: ☑️ How Oksana identifies and re-engages unhealthy accounts ☑️ Where to start when building a knowledge base and customer journey ☑️ How to combine product usage, engagement, and human context in health scoring ☑️ How AI helps customer-facing teams become more independent ☑️ Why personalized outreach works better with disengaged customers ☑️ What Oksana would prioritize when building CS with a team of three ☑️ Why customer and internal relationships remain difficult to replace with technology ---- With Custify, you can: ☑️ automate daily tasks through Playbooks ☑️ build individual customer #HealthScores ☑️ create customer segments ☑️ improve your customer communication strategy ☑️ streamline your onboarding process ☑️ track customers’ journeys every step of the way ☑️ get a 360 view of their progress Want to do great things with your customer success initiative? Keep in touch with us below: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Custify Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Contact Us⁠

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Welcome to Mastering CS – Candid Leader Insights, where I, Irina Cismas, Head of Marketing at Custify, take you on a journey into the depths of Customer Success. Each episode, I sit down with some of the most influential minds in the CS world, from seasoned managers and renowned influencers to dynamic team leaders, to uncover the challenges and opportunities that shape our profession. Our conversations are rich with insights, drawing on personal experiences and innovative ideas to offer practical solutions. Join me as we make every interaction count in the dynamic world of Customer Success!

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