In this engaging episode, Kevin Dean welcomes Lucas Pimenta, an experienced professional in customer operations. Lucas discusses his journey from finance to global customer relations, stressing the importance of empathy and strategic planning in meeting high customer expectations amidst resource constraints. He also explores the transformative role of technology, including AI, in enhancing customer success strategies while balancing efficiency with human touch.

Episode Summary:

Introduction: Kevin Dean introduces Lucas Pimenta, an expert in customer operations with a diverse background in international customer relations and a keen interest in strategic customer success.

Interview Highlights:

Lucas's Journey: Lucas discusses his career evolution from finance to customer operations, emphasizing the importance of understanding customer needs and building lasting relationships across diverse cultural contexts.

Challenges in Customer Operations: Lucas identifies technological advancements and varying customer expectations as primary challenges, stressing the need for personalized, yet efficient service delivery.

Balancing Expectations and Resources: Lucas shares strategies for aligning high customer expectations with limited resources, emphasizing strategic planning and empathetic communication.

Technology's Role in Customer Success: Lucas explores the transformative impact of AI and data-driven tools in optimizing customer interactions and enhancing service delivery.

Key Takeaways:

• Empathy in Customer Relations: Leading with empathy remains crucial in navigating complex customer relationships and delivering personalized solutions.
• Strategic Use of Technology: Leveraging AI and data analytics empowers organizations to better anticipate and meet customer needs while maintaining a human-centered approach.
• Continuous Learning: Adaptability and continuous learning are essential in the evolving landscape of customer operations, enabling professionals to stay ahead and deliver exceptional value.

In this insightful episode, Kevin Dean welcomes Anne McDonnell-Aisiku, Principal Customer Success Manager at HubSpot. Anne shares her unique journey from global education to customer success, offering valuable perspectives on how her background shapes her approach to delivering exceptional customer experiences.

Episode Summary:

Introduction: Kevin Dean introduces the podcast and welcomes Anne McDonnell-Aisiku, highlighting her extensive experience in customer success and her journey from the education sector to HubSpot.

Interview Highlights:

• Anne’s Background: Anne discusses her transition from global education to customer success, emphasizing the parallels between supporting students and managing customer relationships.
• Challenges in Customer Success: Anne outlines the current challenges in the customer success space, including economic headwinds, the need for faster results, and longer sales cycles.
• Balancing High Expectations and Limited Resources: Anne shares her strategies for managing customer expectations while dealing with limited resources, emphasizing the importance of empathetic communication and setting clear expectations.
• Communicating Difficult News: Anne discusses her approach to delivering bad news, stressing the importance of empathy, honesty, and offering alternative solutions.
• Technology and AI in Customer Success: Anne explores how technology and AI are transforming customer success, providing tools that offer deeper insights and enable more effective customer interactions.
• Generative AI Impact: Anne shares her initial hesitations about AI and how she now sees its potential to enhance customer success workflows by freeing up mental space for more strategic tasks.

Key Takeaways:

1. Empathetic Communication: Always lead with empathy and honesty when communicating with customers, especially when delivering bad news.
2. Leveraging Technology: Utilize technology and AI to gain deeper insights into customer behavior and needs, allowing for more meaningful and proactive interactions.
3. Continuous Learning: Stay nimble and continuously update skills and knowledge to keep up with the rapidly evolving customer success landscape.
4. Customer-Centric Approach: Understand and prioritize customers’ goals and KPIs to align efforts and deliver value effectively.

In this exciting episode, Kevin Dean sits down with Aaron Jones, the Head of Strategic Partnerships at Maven AGI. The conversation spans Aaron's journey from a computer science major to his current role, and delves into the dynamic landscape of customer operations and AI.

Episode Summary:

Introduction: Kevin Dean introduces the podcast and welcomes Aaron Jones, highlighting their shared background and long-standing professional relationship.

Interview Highlights:

• Aaron’s Background: Aaron shares his career journey, from his early days as a developer to his pivotal roles at major companies like Adobe, Mixpanel, Sprinkler, Discovery Education, HubSpot, and now Maven AGI.
• AI and Customer Ops: Aaron discusses the similarities and differences between the current AI boom and the internet bubble of the 90s. He emphasizes the strategic application of AI and its significant impact on customer operations.
• Challenges in Customer Service: The discussion touches on the three main challenges: increasing customer expectations, limited resources, and the balance between human capital and technology.
• Framework for Success: Aaron outlines a strategic framework for organizations to efficiently manage customer interactions through self-service, AI, and human resources.
• Technology Evaluation: Insight into how businesses can assess and integrate the best technology solutions to enhance customer experience.

Real-life Example:

• Maven AGI and TripAdvisor: Aaron shares a case study where Maven AGI helped TripAdvisor successfully deflect over 90% of inbound customer support cases using generative AI.

Key Takeaways:

1. Core Competency Focus: Emphasize core strengths and leverage best-in-breed solutions for customer support.
2. Data Strategy: Ensure data is interconnected and contextualized for actionable insights.
3. AI Implementation: Proper training and execution of AI models are crucial for success.
4. Embracing Automation: Automation can enhance efficiency and create new job opportunities, rather than just replacing human roles.

In this exciting season opener, Kevin Dean sits down with Christina Garnett, a customer service and marketing expert known for her customer-obsessed approach. Christina shares her unique journey and provides deep insights into the evolving landscape of customer operations, emphasizing the critical balance between AI integration and human touch in delivering exceptional customer experiences.

Episode Summary:

Introduction: Kevin Dean introduces the podcast and welcomes Christina Garnett, highlighting her extensive experience and passion for customer service.

Interview Highlights:

• Biggest Challenges in Customer Ops: Christina discusses the challenges of integrating AI into customer operations while maintaining the human element crucial for building strong customer relationships.
• AI and Human Balance: The conversation explores how businesses can effectively use AI for automation and personalization while preserving human touchpoints for high-emotion interactions.
• Game Theory in Customer Journeys: Christina introduces the concept of game theory and how it can be applied to map out and personalize customer journeys.
• Training AI: Emphasizing the importance of detailed prompts, Christina advises treating AI like the smartest intern and providing clear guidelines to achieve the best outcomes.
• New Skill Sets in Customer Service: Christina talks about the evolving skill sets required in customer service, including the critical role of being an editor for AI-generated content.

Real-life Examples:

• Using AI Tools: Christina mentions tools like Magi for integrating various AI functionalities and highlights the importance of detailed prompts for better AI results.
• Successful AI Implementation: She shares examples of how companies can use AI effectively without losing the personal touch that customers value.

Key Takeaways:

1. Balance AI and Human Interaction: Understand when to use AI for efficiency and when to maintain human interaction for empathy and connection.
2. Detailed AI Prompts: Treat AI like an intern, providing detailed and specific prompts to guide its outputs.
3. Evolving Skill Sets: Customer service professionals need to develop new skills to effectively manage and edit AI-generated content.
4. Involve Frontline Workers: Include frontline workers in decision-making processes to ensure technology meets their needs and enhances their productivity.
5. Advocacy and Voice: The importance of customer service professionals finding their voice and advocating for their industry.

In this adventure, we are joined by Doug Brown, CEO - Business Success Factors.

Video Summary:

• Introduction.
• Interview: Doug Brown, CEO - Business Success Factors.
• Question of the Day: Name the #1 Webinar you attended in 2020 that delivered the most value. What was the topic?
  Who was the presenter?
  What made it so valuable?

Video Takeaways:

A few key takeaways from this episode:

• People who intentionally work on themselves also see growth in their business.
• Average performers can succeed when working within an excellent process.
• Resolving objections is always better than overcoming objections. 
• Ask "questions that care" to further discover needs in a sales context. 
• Getting truthful is the first step. 

For a copy of Doug's book "Win-Win Selling" go to: https://www.winwinsellingbook.com/

In this adventure, we are joined by Krystina Gillenwater - Director of New Business for Digitopia.

Video Summary:

• Introduction.
• Interview: Krystina Gillenwater - Director of New Business, Digitopia.
• Question of the Day: If you are using HubSpot Snippets - what is your best snippet?

Video Takeaways:

A few key takeaways from this episode:

• RevOps is more than a "flavor-of-the-week" industry buzzword.
• RevOps is a business practice that aims to align an organization's revenue engine. 
• Sales leaders are problem solvers, not pushy influencers. 
• Teaching your customer service people sales techniques can open up more opportunities for your business - it worked at Digitopia. 
• Running after every opportunity by trying to be "all-things-to-everyone" is counterproductive. 
• Get really good at a few things - they you will be known for it. 
• Smarketing Meetings are good - RevOp meeting with your Marketing, Sales AND Service leaders are even better. 

In this adventure, we are joined by Bruce R. Dorey - Executive Coach and Consultant. 

Video Summary:

• Word of the Week: HubSpot Snippets
• Interview: Bruce R. Dorey - Executive Coach and Consultant. 
• Power Play: Learn to Type faster
• Question of the Day: If you are using HubSpot Snippets - what is your best snippet?

Video Takeaways:

A few key takeaways from this episode:

• Data and science are vital parts of executive coaching. 
• Effective coaches are experts in their field as well as human pattern recognition. 
• The key to successful coaching is finding someone who has "been there, done that". 
• Experienced corporate executives bring tremendous value to coaching the next generation of leaders. 
• Leadership is earned.
• Cadences and rhythms are important parts of success. 

For more information on Bruce R. Dorey's coaching and consulting services, please visit his website:
https://www.brucerdorey.com/

In this adventure, we are joined by Bridget Conley, Business Growth Consultant with ManoByte. 

Video Summary:

• Word of the Week: Lead Scoring
• Interview: Bridget Conley, Business Growth Consultant with ManoByte. 
• Power Play: HubSpot Academy Quick Course: Understanding HubSpot Lead Scoring.
• Question of the Day: How are you scoring leads?

Video Takeaways:

A few key takeaways from this episode:

• Throwing technology at a problem isn't always the answer. 
• How can we get to the root of the problem and solve it with what we already have?
• Do your research!
•  Don't assume you know the answer because you think you've been there before. 
• Marketing Professionals need to go on sales calls with the sales team to help improve their marketing. 

In this adventure, we bring back Kevin Dean, President and CEO of ManoByte to get his thoughts on the lessons learned during the year 2020. 
We also dive into Kevin's predictions for the year 2021 and what can be done NOW to succeed in the new year. 

Key Questions Kevin answers in this episode:

• What is it like starting an agency (ManoByte) during the 2009 economic downturn?
• What is the most important thing to do in the last weeks of 2020?
• How can companies prepare for 2021 now?
• How does Kevin stay on top of his "CEO game"?
• At the end of the episode, Kevin shares with us the best advice he has ever received. 

In this adventure, we are joined by Jason Azocar, Founder and CEO of HubSearch. 

Video Summary:

• Word of the Week: MTA - Multi Touch Attribution
• Interview: Jason Azocar, Founder and CEO of HubSearch. 
• Power Play: Block Yourself From Analytics
• Question of the Day: Do you employ Multi-Touch Attribution (MTA) in your marketing?

Video Takeaways:

A few key takeaways from this episode:

• How to apply the Inbound Methodology to recruiting.
• Why you should hire quickly.
• Without a plan to scale your team - you could be missing out on lucrative opportunities.
• Helping both sides (agency & applicant) often leads to amazing results. 
• Recruiting doesn't just happen when you need to make an immediate hire.