Customer Success: How Upper Hand Treats Every Customer Like a Legend

Kasey McKenney is Head of Accounts at Upper Hand, where she started on the Customer Success team more than three years ago. Here she tells us what makes Upper Hand’s customer success stand out among its competitors and how customers benefit from their personalized approach.

How long have you been with Upper Hand, and what is your role?

I’ve been with Upper Hand for more than 4.5 years. I serve as the VP of Account Services, where I oversee all of our account managers and expansions, the service department that builds websites, and the training and implementation process for our customers. 

How does customer success impact Upper Hand’s culture?

Our first core value reads “Treat Every Customer Like a Legend. It really defines the rest of the culture. When our team walks in and buys in, they’re going to go the extra mile to take that late night call and listen to the customer. It really motivates our team to approach every call, email and message with that attitude.

What does customer service mean to you?

Customer service means your customer is walking away extremely happy and feeling like a legend. We want each customer to feel that our team at Upper Hand is not only listening to every concern and piece of feedback, but taking action to improve their business management and overall experience. Whether it be from our support team or an account manager, we want our customers to have the best experience possible at every touch point.

How do you ensure all your customers are fully engaged and getting as much value as possible from Upper Hand?

At the beginning of our customer lifecycle, we ask the customer what their goals are and what they are trying to achieve with the software. Then we build a training roadmap tailored to those identified goals. These goals may not even be software based — growth, revenue, participants, etc — so our team works through various different scenarios to ensure all their goals are achieved. In addition, we consistently follow up with our customers and host monthly check-ins and quarterly reviews to evaluate our roadmap and discuss potential opportunities to improve or restrategize.

How does Upper Hand’s customer service differentiate itself from competitors?

We have a very one-on-one customer experience. Our team does an incredible job building relationships with our customers. We learn about more than just your business, but your family, clients and lifestyle. We want to know as much as we can to customize the software to your needs. Everyone throughout the lifecycle reaches out to ensure our customers know we care about them.

Each Upper Hand customer has their own dedicated account representative. How does this affect a customer’s experience?

It makes it more personal. We don’t answer our customers from a singular help hotline; we go through whatever they are going through. Knowing you have an account representative overseeing your whole process, who is going to bat for you, helps customers get through the hard times. We’re there through software bugs, new features and more. Building relationships like ours are key in this software space. Since we interact with the software every day, going above and beyond to make those relationships makes it feel bigger than just a digital connection. We understand your business and use our partnership to meet your goals.

How can your customer service help customers grow their businesses?

We start at sales and really focus in on their current pain points while running their business. What sets us apart is our training implementation. We look at their goals and understand what they need to do with the software to give them a step up above competitors. Launching software is really helping their business get what they need to reach those larger goals. Essentially, it all goes back to our personal touch. Instead of ordering software off the internet, we’ll give our customers the opportunity to partner with us and build a tailored roadmap that will help them better achieve their goals.

What has been the most rewarding experience you’ve had with a customer? 

That’s a great question — I’d have to say the huge sigh of relief that comes from a majority of our customers (after hearing how Upper Hand can help). A lot of customers pour their lives into their businesses, so hearing that sigh of relief, knowing they’ll be getting time back in their personal life, lets me know what we’re doing here is not as simple as just building software; we’re helping people in the real world.