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Key takeaways
- Panorama sends a weekly email listing new and updated resources to its whole CSM team, per Ashley Rickard.
- Energage shares new or updated education content in a general Slack channel about every two weeks, per Nick Hershey.
- A content library listing every education asset and its URL, tagged by product line and use case, can live in Airtable or a spreadsheet.
- Evan Hall, former Director of Customer Education at Karbon, advises asking CS champions to retell how content helped them in their own words.
- AgentSync’s Monica Sindwani Walsh builds email templates that point CSMs to relevant education resources.
“Hey, do we have any education content on ____?” 🤦
The question comes in more regularly than you’d like. After all, isn’t part of the beauty of on-demand education that fact that it’s self-service?
But, education professionals can (and should) guide internal partners—like Customer Success (CS)—to help them understand what’s available and where they can find the resources they’re looking for. Marketing content is a key part of the job!
Here are some ways to do that:
Build a Content Library For Easy Reference
Create a content library where you list all education content and its URL. Be sure to tag content by product line, use case, etc. to make it easy to search and find. You can use a tool like Airtable or a simple spreadsheet.
Provide a Regular Update by Email or Slack
Nick Hershey (Customer Education Specialist at Energage) and Ashley Rickard (Senior Product Education Manager at Panorama) both advocate for regular updates.
“At Panorama, we send a weekly email to the whole CSM team with a list of our new/updated resources. The predictable cadence is helpful for the CSMs to build time for review into their workflow,” shared Rickard.
“About every two weeks I share some new/updated content in our org's general Slack channel,” Hershey stated.
Pick a cadence that works for you—weekly, biweekly, or monthly—and send customer-facing teammates (including sales) recent content.
Attend Customer Success and Sales Meetings to Share In-Person
Often, your customer-facing teammates are “people people.” And they might prefer to spend some facetime with you learning about new education content! Rather than see your content updates get buried in an inbox or lost in a Slack channel, see if you can be a recurring guest on your CS or sales team’s meetings to share what’s new and good in the world of education.
Find a CS Champion to Promote Your Content
Is there a savvy customer success manager already sharing your education content? Lean on those individuals to remind the CS team of what’s available. Evan Hall, former Director of Customer Education at Karbon, gave the advice: “Ask them to tell the story to their team—in their own words and lingo—of how your content helped them.”
Share Customer Success Stories
Everyone wants to be part of a winning team—and they want to share the things that are popular. As customers share what they love about your education content, share those stories loudly and proudly. This will keep your education programs top of mind—and encourage internal team members to continue looking for and sharing that content with their customers.
Add Education Content to Customer Success Playbooks
“Another step we took to increase CS awareness of educational content was creating playbooks for CSM calls where related content was linked. This way, the CSM could get accustomed to what content was appropriate during different areas of their customer sessions,” shared Hershey.
Create Templates for Customer Success to Share
Monica Sindwani Walsh (Customer Enablement Manager at AgentSync) found that being prescriptive is helpful. Her team creates email templates that point to relevant resources. Next up for Monica: Creating copy/paste templates that address the top questions CSMs get asked.
In the ever-evolving landscape of customer education, ensuring your internal partners have seamless access to educational resources is necessary. By implementing a structured approach, such as building a comprehensive content library and adopting proactive communication methods like regular updates via email or Slack, we bridge the gap between education and execution. The wisdom shared here by our peers highlights the value of consistency and engagement in these efforts.
FAQs
How do you get customer-facing teams to share education content?
Guide internal partners like customer success to what exists and where to find it. The post shares several tactics: build a content library for easy reference, provide a regular update by email or Slack, attend customer success and sales meetings to share in person, find a CS champion to promote your content, share customer success stories, add education content to CS playbooks, and create templates teams can send.
How should you organize education content so teams can find it?
Build a content library that lists all education content and its URL, tagged by product line, use case, and similar attributes so it is easy to search and find. You can use a tool like Airtable or a simple spreadsheet. This gives internal partners a single reference point rather than repeatedly asking whether education content exists on a given topic.
How often should you update internal teams about new education content?
Choose a cadence that works for you, whether weekly, biweekly, or monthly, and send customer-facing teammates recent content. At Panorama, a weekly email goes to the whole CSM team listing new and updated resources, and the predictable cadence helps CSMs build review time into their workflow. At Energage, new content is shared in a general Slack channel about every two weeks.
How can playbooks and templates help teams share education content?
Playbooks and templates make sharing easy and prescriptive. Creating playbooks for CSM calls with related content linked helps CSMs learn what content fits different parts of a customer session. Email templates that point to relevant resources, and copy-and-paste templates addressing the top questions CSMs get asked, reduce the effort required to surface education to customers.
