Time to First Value (TTFV) is a commonly used Customer Engagement metric to measure the efficiency of the customer Onboarding process, but not generally a Sales KPI.
But it should be.
How can we hold Sales accountable for the customers they bring in – getting them Onboard and setup for long-term success (and expansion!) – without them owning the customer post-sale?
And how can this accountability be used to change the behavior of Sales to accelerate the stream of Good-fit customers, and eliminate the Bad-fit customers, without telling them to “stop closing Bad-fit customers?”
Enter, TTFV.
As I said, TTVF is a commonly used Customer Engagement metric to measure the efficiency of the customer Onboarding process, but not generally a Sales KPI.
But since you can’t solve upstream problems downstream, we need a way to fix things upstream. Stop dumping toxic chemicals into the stream.
Since TTFV is the amount of time between the close of the sale and when the customer is Onboard – and is our goal timeframe for Onboarding customers – we can use this as a Sales KPI to accelerate the stream of Good-fit customers (customers with Success Potential) and eliminate the Bad-fit customers. Here’s how.
Each customer is associated with the sales rep. Obviously.
The Sales rep is managed and/or compensated on the customer achieving TTFV:
- Faster than the goal (> 2 days faster) – bigger bonus
- On the goal (<> 2 days) – bonus
- Slower than the goal
- First time: Intervention to see what’s going on, suggested fix if necessary.
- Second time: Penalty (as well as intervention with customer)
- Third time: Termination (plus intervention with customer)
Why does this work?
Because we understand how Sales works and instead of trying to totally change things, we just fit into how they already operate.
With this strategy, now Sales has an incentive to bring in Good-fit customers (and reject Bad-fit customers), as well as properly manage (what I call “Orchestrate”) post-sale expectations, and perform a proper Handoff, and can quickly get the benefits of doing so.
About Lincoln Murphy
