Being a Customer Success Manager (CSM) can be an extremely rewarding career. A CSM works hand-in-hand with customers, guiding them through the customer journey and fostering a positive connection. They speak up for customers’ business goals and try to guess how to reach those goals and how they might change over time.
Leaders look for people with a wide range of skills when they hire a CSM, from the ability to build relationships and understand people’s emotions to being resourceful and good with technology. Some of these skills are easy to spot when you first meet someone, but most of the time, interviewers will ask Customer Success Manager questions to find out if a candidate naturally has these skills or has the drive and ability to learn them.
Totango is always looking for great people to join our team, so we asked some of our leaders to share the best Customer Success Manager interview questions they get asked and the best answers they come up with. Check out their responses below!.
Landing a job at a fast-growing tech company like Totango is an exciting opportunity. As a leader in customer success software, Totango is selective in who they hire to maintain their reputation for innovation and excellence.
If you have an interview coming up, proper preparation will be key. In this comprehensive guide, we’ll explore the top 20 most common Totango interview questions, providing tips and sample answers to help you put your best foot forward.
Overview of Totango
Totango is headquartered in San Francisco and develops SaaS solutions designed to help businesses enhance customer experiences and drive growth through data-driven insights Their platform provides real-time analytics on customer engagement, predictive models for churn risk, and tools to increase user adoption.
Some key facts about Totango:
- Founded in 2010 by Guy Nirpaz and Eran Savir.
- 400+ global employees.
- Over 250 enterprise customers including Microsoft, SAP, and Zendesk.
- Raised $60 million in funding.
Totango is frequently ranked as a leader in customer success software, competing against companies like Gainsight and ChurnZero. They are known for their innovative use of big data and machine learning to empower businesses to better understand their customers.
1. Why do you want to work at Totango?
This is a common opening question that establishes your interest and motivations. Totango will look for candidates genuinely passionate about their mission of revolutionizing customer success.
Sample Answer: I’ve been impressed by Totango’s meteoric growth and innovation in leveraging data science to enhance the customer experience. Having the opportunity to work on products that help businesses foster loyalty and growth by truly understanding their customers would be the ideal next step for me. Totango’s collaborative culture and leadership in this niche industry make it my top choice. I’m eager to contribute my skills in client relations and analytics to help advance Totango’s vision.
2. What can you bring to Totango that someone else cannot?
With this behavioral question, interviewers want to understand your unique strengths. Draw on your background and qualities that set you apart.
Sample Answer: I believe my blend of sales experience and a data-driven mindset sets me apart. Having been on the front lines of customer relations, I understand firsthand the frustrations of limited visibility into customer happiness and churn risk. This enables me to approach product design from an empathetic viewpoint, always considering how features will translate into salesperson and customer value. Combine this with my analytics skills – extracting insights, predicting trends and my expertise would allow me to enhance Totango’s offerings in a unique way.
3. How do you stay up-to-date on customer success best practices?
Totango values continuous learning, so demonstrating your dedication is key. Share resources and your process for staying current.
Sample Answer: Staying current is crucial, so I use multiple channels to ensure I’m always expanding my customer success knowledge. I subscribe to industry publications like Customer Success Magazine and regularly check out blogs like Lincoln Murphy’s Customer Success Blog. I also attend local customer success meetups and virtual events like Pulse Everywhere to connect with peers. Internally, I spend time shadowing customer success teammates and reviewing case studies to understand what works. These continuous learning touchpoints help me refine my daily practices to align with the latest customer success strategies.
4. How would you handle a difficult customer that is thinking of churning?
This situational question tests your judgement and client management skills. Show empathy while outlining a systematic process.
Sample Answer: My first step would be active listening, asking open-ended questions to understand their frustrations fully. I’d then use data-backed insights from Totango to diagnose potential issues triggering dissatisfaction. With this context, I could provide personalized recommendations, like feature enhancements or workflow changes to re-engage them. If the concern required troubleshooting, I would loop in any relevant cross-functional teams to provide swift resolution. Finally, I would leverage Totango’s predictive models to assess their churn risk and tailor retention initiatives like loyalty incentives or customer success coaching. My aim would be constructive dialogue and Early Action to turn them into a promoter.
5. How do you motivate yourself on days when you aren’t feeling productive?
This self-awareness question gauges resilience amid challenges. Share tactics you use professionally to power through slumps.
Sample Answer: We all have low-motivation days, and I have some tactics to minimize productivity dips. Switching tasks can often reignite my energy, so I’ll move to my next priority or tackle some quick admin items to build momentum. Taking a quick break to refresh is also useful. But above all, focusing on my overarching goals and the positive impact of my work re-grounds me on why I’m here in the first place. At Totango, knowing I’m supporting a product that enables businesses to better serve their customers would drive me on days when my personal motivation wavers.
6. Tell me about a time you had a conflict at work. How did you handle it?
This behavioral question tests your conflict management skills. Keep your answer positive and show self-awareness.
Sample Answer: While at [company], I noticed discrepancies between sales team CRM data and our marketing lead generation numbers. This caused confusion over lead follow-ups. Recognizing the risks of this misalignment, I scheduled a meeting with sales and marketing leadership to discuss driving consistency. By presenting the issue objectively and allowing both teams to share their concerns, we identified the root cause and developed new protocols for inter-departmental communication. Although initially touchy, I maintained a collaborative approach, which diffused tensions. This alignment ultimately improved handoffs and increased qualified leads by about 19% over the next quarter.
7. You notice a process bottleneck that is impacting customer renewals. What steps would you take?
This situational question gauges analytical abilities and process improvement skills. Demonstrate a methodical approach.
Sample Answer: First, I’d collect data to validate the scope and frequency of the issue to present clear supporting evidence. Next, I’d schedule a meeting with involved departments to brainstorm root causes – perhaps there’s an underlying technical limitation or lack of automation causing the bottleneck. With the insights from that meeting, I could perform an impact analysis on the customer experience and projected revenue. Armed with these metrics, I would present a plan of potential process changes, like adding workflow approval steps or implementing an RPA bot to management for buy-in. Throughout the process, I’d keep an open loop of communication with the customer success team to ensure continuity until the process improvement is implemented.
8. Tell me about a time you successfully onboarded a new client. What steps did you take?
This question tests your ability to set clients up for a positive journey. Share a specific example outlining your onboarding process.
Sample Answer: Recently I onboarded ACME Co, a technology startup that purchased our Scale plan. To ensure a smooth onboarding, I established an implementation roadmap aligned to their business goals and created educational onboarding materials tailored to their industry. Conducting regular check-ins and sending new feature announcements maintained engagement during ramp-up. I also tracked product adoption metrics daily within Totango to ensure utilization and requested user feedback, which highlighted opportunities for further training. My proactive approach resulted in ACME meeting all adoption targets within the first month. They recently expanded their contract due to the value realized.
9. How would you resolve a conflict between team members you manage?
This situational question demonstrates your people management abilities. Show a structured yet compassionate approach.
Sample Answer: My first priority would be to speak independently with each team member, making them feel heard in a non-judgmental way. Using active listening techniques, I’d invite them to share their perspective while keeping an open mind to understand the core issues. If appropriate, I would arrange a meeting for open dialogue under clear guidelines, ensuring it’s a constructive conversation. I would then work with them collaboratively to find a solution, focusing on mutual understanding rather than blame. If tensions persist, I would bring in HR partners to objectively mediate and resolve the situation in alignment with company policies. Overall, I aim to handle conflicts at the lowest level possible with compassion while upholding team harmony and productivity.
10. Describe a time you had to be detail-oriented in your work. What was the outcome?
This behavioral question tests how detail-oriented you are – an important skill in data-driven roles. Share a specific example.
Sample Answer: When conducting client usage analytics, I noticed a small subset of customers with unusually low engagement data. I dug deeper into their usage trends instead of discounting them as outliers. My analysis uncovered an integration error that affected imports for that customer segment. Because I zeroed in on the details, I was able to swiftly diagnose the issue before churn arose and work cross-functionally to implement a fix, resulting in a 21% increase in engagement for the impacted clients. This demonstrated the power of decimal-point level analysis.
11. Tell me about a time you successfully educated a customer on a product they were struggling with. What was the outcome?
This behavioral question tests your educational abilities and customer empathy. Response should demonstrate patience and strong communication skills.
Sample Answer: I had a customer complaining that our reporting functionalities were too complex for their team. Instead of reacting defensively, I scheduled an
5 Key Customer Success Manager Interview Questions
The ideal response for this question would be for the candidate to share insights into who they are as a person, what drives their passion and what they value most. According to author and motivational speaker Simon Sinek, a Why statement is “the compelling higher purpose that inspires us and acts as the source of all we do.” Since a Why statement is personal, there is no exact right or wrong answer, but it should be reflective of who the candidate truly is and what matters to them. If you don’t already know your Why, you can start to determine it by asking yourself questions like who or what is most important to you, what motivates you to be your best, or what are you most passionate about?
How do you navigate your customers’ product desires with the product team’s roadmap initiatives? How do you serve as an advocate while still managing expectations?
This question is an opportunity for the candidate to showcase their problem-solving skills. “Most importantly, I would want the customer to feel like they were being heard and that their problems were being taken care of,” is an example of a good answer. Before I did anything else, I would go over some possible solutions to their problems and make sure they are using the tool the right way. Then, if I saw a hole or a need for a product improvement, I would make a strong case to the product team, including user stories, problem statements, and any other materials they might need. If it makes sense, I would set up a meeting between the customer and the product team so that the customer could voice their concerns and the product team could respond and offer a solution. After that, I would act as a go-between for the customer and the product team to make sure that the customer’s expectations about when and how the solution would be put in place were met. ”.
Totango Interview with Ernie Fontes
FAQ
Why do you want to work in customer success?
How to ace a user research interview?
