Improving Customer Retention Through Journey Insights

𝗘𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘆𝗼𝘂'𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗼𝗼 𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗲. 𝗔𝗻𝗱 𝗶𝘁'𝘀 𝘄𝗵𝘆 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗿𝗲𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝘀𝗻'𝘁 𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗿𝗼𝘃𝗶𝗻𝗴. In Customer Success, most teams rely on lagging indicators:  • Logins dropped  • Customer ghosted for 30+ days  • Customer says, “𝘞𝘦’𝘳𝘦 𝘦𝘷𝘢𝘭𝘶𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘷𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘰𝘳𝘴…” These are all accurate signs of churn. But by the time they show up? 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝗵𝗮𝘀 𝗮𝗹𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝘆 𝗳𝗮𝗶𝗹𝗲𝗱. 𝗬𝗼𝘂’𝗿𝗲 𝗻𝗼𝘄 𝗶𝗻 𝘀𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝗱𝗲 — Low odds. High effort. And emotionally draining for your team. Here’s the fix: 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁 𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝙡𝙚𝙖𝙙𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝗶𝗻𝗱𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀. Few companies ever create them because the truth is: Leading indicators don’t naturally exist in your business. You have to 𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗺. So what 𝘪𝘴 a leading indicator? It’s a signal that appears before the customer knows they’re in trouble (that you know is associated with churn risk) And while you still have the time (and relationship strength) to do something about it. 𝗛𝗲𝗿𝗲’𝘀 𝗵𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗺: 𝟭. 𝗦𝘁𝘂𝗱𝘆 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗯𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗰𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿𝘀: Pick 2–3 accounts with clear, measurable success.    𝟮. 𝗜𝗱𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗳𝘆 𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘆 𝗱𝗶𝗱 𝗲𝗮𝗿𝗹𝘆: What were the key processes, decisions, or actions that led to their results?    𝟯. 𝗔𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻 𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗴: When should every new customer do the same things? (7 days in? 30 days in?)    𝟰. 𝗕𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱 𝗰𝗵𝗲𝗰𝗸𝗽𝗼𝗶𝗻𝘁𝘀: Use your product, CRM, and QBRs to confirm: Did it happen? Or is a risk forming? 𝗘𝘅𝗮𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗲 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗺𝘆 𝗰𝗹𝗶𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 (𝗲𝗺𝗮𝗶𝗹 𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗦𝗮𝗮𝗦): Leading indicators of future churn:  • No single owner of email strategy assigned - by Day 7  • No sales email sent - by Day 7  • Marketing calendar isn’t filled out 6 weeks ahead by Day 90 If any of these are missing — no, the customer won’t churn tomorrow. But they 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 eventually. And if you wait, you’ll be stuck in a low success rate “save mode”. When you act on leading indicators:  • You prevent problems while they’re still small  • You keep your team proactive, not panicked  • You shift retention from firefighting to forecasting 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻𝗱𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗰𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗸? #customersuccess

I just found the exact moment customers decide to buy again vs. disappear forever. It's not when you think. After years building retention strategies, I thought I knew the key touchpoints: → Purchase confirmations → Shipping updates → First unboxing experience Standard retention playbook stuff. Then, a brand I work with ran customer data through Triple Whale's Moby AI. It completely flipped my assumptions. Moby analyzed 12 months of customer behavior. What it found shocked me. The decision point isn't in the first 30 days. It's not even in the first purchase experience. It happens at day 47. During the second browse session. Before they even add to cart again. Here's what Moby spotted: → Customers who browse NEW categories (not their original purchase) within 45-50 days = 89% repeat buyer rate → Those who browse the SAME category = Only 23% repeat buyer rate This pattern was invisible to us. We were optimizing the wrong moments. While we focused on post-purchase flows, the real retention lever was curiosity-driven browsing seven weeks later. The results: → Testing retention campaigns based on cross-category browsing → 34% higher repeat purchase rates so far Moby isn't just analyzing data. It's trained on $55B+ in ecommerce behavior patterns. It sees connections humans miss. Shopify invested $25M+ in Triple Whale because this level of insight changes everything. Retention isn't about perfect onboarding anymore. It's about understanding the invisible moments that predict lifetime value. And most of us are optimizing the wrong moments. Comment "MOBY" and I'll share the agent library that's changing how brands are thinking about customer retention. Check it out: https://bit.ly/4nJ3Axs #TWPartner

The moment after conversion is when most companies stop optimizing. It's also precisely when the most valuable customer relationship building begins. I've watched countless enterprises pour millions into acquisition, only to neglect the critical post-purchase journey that determines whether that customer ever returns. It's a costly psychological blind spot. After helping companies like Adobe and Nike optimize their digital experiences for over a decade, I've seen this pattern repeatedly: ↳ Companies celebrate the conversion, then immediately shift focus back to acquiring the next customer But the "recency effect" means your customer's last impression of your company is the one that sticks. A seamless checkout experience followed by a confusing onboarding process or silence creates cognitive dissonance that erodes trust. One SaaS client we worked with was losing 42% of new users within the first week after conversion. By implementing a structured onboarding process with progressive revelation of features, we reduced that to under 15%. There are three post-purchase communication strategies that consistently drive retention: ↳ Proactive communication about both positive AND negative situations (address potential issues before customers experience them) ↳ Structured onboarding that guides users to their first "win" with your product as quickly as possible ↳ Strategically framed review requests that set the right expectations (the difference between "Tell us what you love" vs. "Give us your feedback" is massive) The companies that master the post-purchase experience don't just retain customers... they create advocates who drive acquisition more effectively than your marketing ever could. Does your optimization effort stop short?

A loyal, multi‑year client ends a retainer with barely a goodbye email. Projects hit deadlines, budgets held, and yet the relationship still slipped away... In agency land, client churn rarely arrives as a dramatic flare‑up. More often it is a quiet drift: Slack threads go cold, the next‑quarter brief never shows, and the renewal line stays blank. The danger is that it feels painless until you add up the lost lifetime value, the scramble to backfill revenue, and the referrals that were never even requested. Silent churn hides in the gap between delivery and relationship management. Whenever “no news” is mistaken for “all good,” the countdown has already started. Let's apply a systems approach as we would across our Barrel Holdings agencies: The silent‑churn autopsy: - No quarterly business reviews (QBRs) or formal check‑ins - Value delivered wasn’t documented or celebrated - Leadership lacked a dashboard for account health - Post‑project follow‑ups never happened - Referral and expansion opportunities quietly died on the vine 1. Map the breakdown: - Missing QBR rhythm, feedback loops, health scorecards - No early‑warning indicators or escalation paths - No structured post‑delivery cadence to drive referrals 2. Re‑ground the team in core fundamentals: - Communicate exceptionally: relationships need rituals - Surface value: delivered work must be made visible - Define “healthy” clearly: simple, shared success metrics - Learn fast: lost clients become internal case studies, not mysteries 3. Fix the operational gaps: - Launch quarterly client feedback surveys (explore NPS + open prompts) - Add project debriefs/AARs as a mandatory close‑out step - Assign strategic sponsors to top‑tier accounts and track health scores in a live dashboard - Standardize a QBR template: goals, wins, upcoming risks, growth ideas 4. Reinforce with structure, rhythm, visibility, incentives, feedback: - Every key account has an owner responsible for retention insights - QBRs and health‑score reviews run every quarter, no skips - Account dashboards shared in weekly leadership meetings - Retention metrics baked into performance reviews and shout‑outs - Client survey results drive immediate tweaks to delivery SOPs 5. Watch the ripple effects: - AMs may need coaching to lead strategic conversations - PMs tie delivery metrics to client value, not just deadlines - Strong retention fuels referrals and upsells, compounding growth Success looks like: - 100% of top‑tier clients receive a QBR every quarter - Live health scores flag at‑risk accounts before contracts lapse - Churn rate drops, referral revenue climbs - Relationship health becomes a line item in every leadership review - Silent churn ends when relationship stewardship is systemized, not left to chance. == 🟢 Find this useful? Subscribe to AgencyHabits for weekly systems‑thinking insights. The full Agency Systems Playbook drops in May—subscribers get first access.